Looking for ways to increase profits by cooking, canning, freezing, frying, chopping, or pickling your raw agricultural products, and selling them in jars, pouches, cans, bottles, bags, or boxes? This page offers resources and tools for making and selling value-added food products.

Product Cost Calculators

Videos

Podcasts

Tutorials

Publications

Materials from the Beyond Fresh Project

Other Links

Product Cost Calculators

Choose the right calculator for your situation and estimate the profitability of value-added products made in a commercial kitchen.

Commercial Kitchen On Your Farm (Excel)
Instructions for On-Your-Farm Calculator (PDF)

Commercial Kitchen Hourly Rental (Excel)
Instructions for Hourly Rental Calculator (PDF)

Commercial Kitchen Long Term Lease (Excel)
Instructions for Long-Term Lease Calculator (PDF)

Commercial Kitchen Build Operate (Excel)
Instructions for Build-Operate Calculator (PDF)

Data Collection Worksheet (Excel)
Use this handy Excel worksheet in the kitchen while you test products to jot down information you will need later for the calculators above

Videos

Food Safety for Organic Growers in Texas
Food Safety Regulations for Local Farmers
Connecting with Institutional Markets: Strategies and Programs for Producers
Grow Montana: Montana Food System Notes
Selling Local Food to Schools: USDA Regulations

Podcasts

Value-Added Products at Boggy Creek Farm in Austin, Texas
Working with Your Meat Processor
Beyond Fresh: A Value-Added Guide

Tutorials

Scaling Up for Regional Markets
This tutorial provides lessons and information for farmers who have success in smaller and more direct marketing channels and who are interested in expanding their operations to meet a growing demand for local food. There is a specific lesson on Value-added Products.

Materials from the Beyond Fresh Project

In 2018, a team led by the National Center for Appropriate Technology completed a three-year research and education project called Beyond Fresh: Expanding Markets for Sustainable Value-added Food Products in Texas. Materials from the project are available below. We hope you find them useful.

Beyond Fresh: a Food-Processing Guide for Texas Farmers

Taking a “Farmer First Approach,” this workbook helps you decide what products to create, how to make and sell them, and at what scale. It includes chapters on developing products, dealing with regulations and food safety laws, designing labels and packaging, and seeking funding for your new food enterprise.
Buy a hard copy or download the PDF here.

Value-Added Product Cost Calculators

See links near the top of this page.

Crops Available to Process Calculator (Excel)

This calculator allows you to estimate the pounds of vegetables and herbs (imperfect and unsold #1s) that you have available for processing, and track their availability in each month of the year.

Beyond Fresh: Food Processing Market Opportunities (PDF)

This April 2016 market research report by Dr. Rodney B. Holcomb and Dr. Timothy Bowser (Food Mech, LLC) includes chapters on Organic Foods; Millennial Shoppers; Fermented and Pickled/Acidified Foods, and Salsa; Vegetables: Canned, Dried, and Otherwise Processed; Fruits: Dried, Jams/Jellies; and Prepared Meals and Sides.

Final Beyond Fresh Project Report

This April 2016 market research report by Dr. Rodney B. Holcomb and Dr. Timothy Bowser (Food Mech, LLC) includes chapters on Organic Foods; Millennial Shoppers; Fermented and Pickled/Acidified Foods, and Salsa; Vegetables: Canned, Dried, and Otherwise Processed; Fruits: Dried, Jams/Jellies; and Prepared Meals and Sides.

Resource Directory

This directory, housed on the Texas Center for Local Food website, includes many resources for value-added food product development in Texas, including potential buyers, commercial kitchens, food manufacturing facilities, food brokers, food distributors, and food analysis labs.

Project poster

Materials shown above, from the Beyond Fresh Project, are based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under award number 2014-38640-22155 through the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program under subaward number LS14-264. USDA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider..

Other Links

• SARE Farm to Table: Building Local and Regional Food Systems
• USDA Rural Development, Value-Added Producer Grants
• National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, “Farmers Guide to Applying for the Value-Added Producer Grant Program”
• Robert M. Kerr Food and Agricultural Products Center
• Oregon State University Value-Added Food Product Development
• Agricultural Marketing Resource Center

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