Shop Local Online With Firefly Food Hub
Firefly Farm Wichita recently launched an online store for twice-weekly offerings of fresh fruits, vegetables and other local products. Suppliers’ products in the Firefly Food Hub come from a variety of local farms and kitchens including Elderslie Farm & Creamery, Reverie Coffee, Piper Pastures Eggs, Grace Gardens Flower Farm, Better Yet Coffee, Grazing Plains Farm, Viola’s Pantry Pasta, PeeWee+Sweets Bakehouse, and Urban Prairie.
The response from restaurant and neighborhood customers has been very positive. The live-inventory, digital platform is easy to navigate and pick-up is convenient. While we loved seeing everyone at Firefly’s farmers markets in the past and they were definitely a lot of fun, what we’re trying to do with online ordering is make it more accessible to eat local all the time.
Local Favorites in One Stop
The Firefly Food Hub is your one-stop shop for locally grown, raised and made food and home essentials. Perfect for families living in east Wichita, Andover, Benton, Augusta and surrounding areas, ordering is easy and pick-up is convenient. Swing by on your way home from work or after school on Tuesday or Friday afternoon or evening. Stock your shelves with sustainably produced staples and support several local small businesses, too!
Firefly aims to make it simple and convenient to eat fresh, local food year round. It takes a real, community-wide effort to make that happen. Food Hub CEO Leah Dannar-Garcia and her team recently installed a new building near the farm’s front gate for order pick-up. Inside, retail customers grab prepaid orders in earth-friendly packaging from the shelf or refrigerator. Pick-up is available twice weekly—Tuesdays and Fridays from noon to 7 P.M.
Wichita Grown, Raised and Made
Firefly’s 5 acre urban farm is located between Wichita and Andover along 21st Street North. In the Garcia family for nearly a century, Firefly Farm launched a wholesale, commercial growing operation in 2015 with an extensive offering of heirloom tomatoes and a few other summer crops. Firefly Farm began hosting farmers markets in 2017. Using organic growing practices, Firefly crops are popular with many local restaurants in addition to retail customers.
Launching the online store in response to shutdowns and shortages was Firefly’s genuine effort to counter growing concerns around the strength of our international food supply chain. Firefly did not grow for wholesale or retail sales last year. Instead, we devoted our time and attention to building this digital platform. Standing subscription service and expanded pick-up hours are in the works for next season.
Leah Dannar-Garcia grew up two doors west of Firefly Farm and played here as a kid; the experience left her with a deep love of animals and the farming life. She spent her early adult years in New York City. Later, she travelled and worked in countries around the world before returning to Wichita in 1998 and marrying the boy next door soon after.
She will never forget the persimmon groves she saw in Korea, the lady finger bananas she ate in Mexico, or the vineyards she toured in the Republic of Georgia. Those far away experiences had a great impact on her ideas about regional agriculture and cuisine. From the types of crops grown here, to the farmers markets, farm-to-table dinners, and public venue space, her vision is taking shape. In the near future, it includes adding a u-pick operation and seasonal café. She gets little free time these days, but when she does, she enjoys music and the visual arts, hiking and kayaking in SE Kansas, and essay writing.
