This document provides guidance on starting a container farm business. It discusses identifying ideal customers through creating customer personas. It also covers important considerations like investment planning through grants and loans, choosing a suitable location that meets zoning requirements, designing the container farm setup, getting training, and growing and harvesting crops. The document concludes with information on selling crops and branding the business. The overall summary is this guide outlines the key steps and factors to take into account when starting a container farm business, from the initial planning phases through to operating and marketing the business.

1. How to Start a
Container Farm Business
A helpful guide for beginners, brought to you by

2. Have you ever wondered how to start
a container farm business?
You’re not alone.
Vertical farming continues to be a
growing trend, with the vertical
farming market set to reach $20
billion between now and 2026.
Global population growth concerns
about food production, increasing
interest in green infrastructure, and
technological advancements in
aeroponics, hydroponics, and
aquaponics have amplified the
interest and practice of vertical
farming.

3. Using stacked farming to produce food
in vertical spaces, vertical farming is
an attractive option to traditional
methods of farming, opening more
opportunities for year-round freshly
grown and locally accessed food.
While the idea of vertical farming may
be a striking consideration, the
business side is often complex and
confusing.
We’ve written this guide, as an
informative piece to help navigate
new and even current container farm
owners on how to start their business.
In this guide, we’ll look at a few
things to help you get started,
including:
 Types of customers
 Investment planning
 Container location and design
 Helpful training
 Growing and harvesting
 Selling and branding
Let’s start planning for your container
farm journey!

4. Types of Vertical Farming Customers
For any business, an important question a business owner should ask themselves is
“who is the type of customer I want to attract?”
Customers are the lifeblood of any business, regardless if you’re selling to customers
or even other businesses.
And because they are an integral part to your business, it’s important that you
discover the type of customer your container farm business is appealing to.
The best way to discover this is by creating a customer avatar or customer persona.
A customer avatar is a detailed profile of your ideal customer, focusing on just one
ideal person and going into greater depths about who they are, what they do, what
challenges they may be facing, and in some cases, how your business is able to solve
those challenges.

5. A customer persona is purely based on the type of customer your business wants
to market to, so not all personas are the same.
The importance of the avatar is to try to discover what your ideal customer
would be and then arrange your marketing or selling towards that idea.

6. Example Customer Persona
 Name: Jim Taylor
 Age: 32
 Marital status: single
 #/age of children: 0
 Location: Phoenix, AZ
 Occupation: Programmer
 Level of Education: bachelor’s degree
 Challenge: wants to change his diet to
become healthier after a death in the
family. Jim wants to add more vegetables
and fruits into his diet, but he doesn’t
want to eat foods that may have been
sprayed with pesticides.
What does this customer avatar tell us?
Well, this customer wants to have a healthier
diet, by adding more vegetables and fruits
into his daily eating. He’s concerned about
pesticide use on crops, so he may be looking
into trying or buying organic greens.
His occupation is also key, as he has a position
that requires you to sit for most of the day.
This could be the reason Jim wants to eat
healthier – maybe the prolong sitting is
causing joint pain or he might be prone to
unhealthy snacking while he’s working.
Marital status can also be important – as a
programmer, Jim might work late and is able
to cook food at home or perhaps he ends up
picking up fast food due to the late-night
hours.

7. Example Customer Persona #2
 Name: Maggie Smith
 Age: 26
 Marital status: married
 #/age of children: 1 child, aged 4
 Location: Denver, CO
 Occupation: Chef
 Level of Education: bachelor’s degree
 Challenge: healthy eater, but always
looking for new recipes to try. Enjoys
shopping at the farmer’s markets on the
weekend. Trying to get her young child to
enjoy vegetables at an early age.
In this persona, Maggie already enjoys a
healthy lifestyle and enjoys discovering
new ways to eat healthy.
Because she enjoys shopping at farmer’s
markets, she is most likely looking for
locally grown foods to eat and use.
In her profession as a chef, she may also be
looking for different avenues of getting and
using locally grown food and produce. She’s
also trying to teach her young child to
incorporate vegetables into his own diet.

8. What do both of these avatars tell you about the ideal customer?
In this case, both of these individuals are interested in eating healthier,
especially along the lines of organic and locally grown foods in their area.
For your container farm business, this might be the opportunity to provide some
of your crops to a local restaurant or a grocery store or even selling your produce
at a local farmer’s market.
As mentioned, the purpose of a customer persona is to figure out who your
business will be catering to.
This doesn’t mean you have to stick to a particular customer!
Customers, like crops and produce, come in many different flavors, so while
these may be your ideal personas, it doesn’t mean you have to stick to just those
avatars.

9. Investment Planning for
Container Farm Businesses
Now that we’ve discovered what kind
of customer you want to attract with
your container farm business, the
next step gets into the financial side
of things.
We’re not going to lie – starting a
container farm business is expensive;
some containers can even cost up to
$120,000!
Pure Greens does offer affordable
pricing for our container systems,
however we also understand that
most people don’t have thousands of
dollars just lying around.

10. But now that the shock has worn off, that doesn’t mean you need to give up your dream.
There are a variety of different programs, grants, and loans out there that can help you get
started in the container farm business.
We even wrote a blog about the different ways to get a loan or a grant.
In summary, we discovered 10 different loans and grants that are helping to pay for part or even
all setup costs for your container farm business. Here’s a quick rundown:
1. USDA Specialty Crop Block Grant Program –
designed for those just beginning in farming, the
SCBGP is a program designed to enhance the
competitiveness of specialty crops. Many of these
crops can be grown within a container farm. Go to
the main webpage to learn more about this grant.
2. USDA Value Added Producer Grant – another grant
by the United States Department of Agriculture
(USDA), this grant helps to fund farmers who are
generating new products, expanding marketing
opportunities, and increasing producer income.
Beginning farmers will sometimes receive priority
when applying. To learn more about the VAPG, check
out their website.
3. USDA Rural Energy for America Program – The REAP
provides funding to farmers that are using renewable
energy systems or are improving the efficiency of
any of their existing systems. This is a great grant as
container farms qualify as a renewable energy
system. Learn more at their website.
3. Farm Service Agency Farm Operating Loans –
switching our focus now to available loans, FSA loans are
designed to help farmers start, maintain, or strengthen
their farm or ranch and is a great place to start for
financing your container farm. Discover more on their
website.
4. FSA Farm Ownership Loans – FSA ownership loans are
another great choice for first time farmers, as it provides
100% of the funding necessary to start your farm. To learn
more, visit their website.

11. Finding a
Container Farm
Business
Location
We’ve taken the first two steps in considering a
container farm business – creating a customer
persona and looking into investment planning
involving grants and loans – and this next step is
another crucial item that should be considered in
the first initial concept.
While the advantage of container farming is the
versatility of growing food within areas that would
normally not be used for farming or are outside of
the preferred farming locale, you still need to
choose a location for your container farm business
and that often includes finding out what location
you can use for your container farm business.

12. Zoning and
Permits
Unfortunately, you might not be able to purchase a container farm and just
set it on your front lawn or even in the parking lot of your favorite grocery
store.
This is because of zoning laws and permits.
While both residential and business locations are subject to zoning and
permits, what exactly does that mean? And how does it affect your
container farm business?
Zoning laws are a set of guidelines set up by local governments and
municipalities that help guide the development and growth of the area.
Zoning is often used to preserve the character of a neighborhood and
ensures new development is compatible with existing uses and communities.
As mentioned, residential zones are usually categorized as land that’s used
for single family housing, multi-family residential housing, or mobile homes.
Residential zoning tends to be more restrictive than business zoning and are
highly protected.
Farmers usually look at agricultural, industrial, or commercial zoning
permits when they want to start a farming, or a container farming, business.

13. Tips on Farm
Zoning and
Container
Zoning Laws
When it comes to zoning and permits as it relates to farming,
especially container farming, it’s always best to speak with
your city or country’s zoning department. This is because
every location is different, even within the same city or
suburban area, so knowing what your location requires or the
location you plan on placing your container farm requires is
crucial.
Even if you do plan on starting your container farm
business in your backyard, you still must make sure that
you’re meeting any permit requirements or bylaws set by
a homeowner’s association, for example.
UrbanAgLaw.org has a very detailed look at planning and
zoning that you can learn more about.

14. Container Farm Land Considerations
If you’re looking at zoning and permits,
then you have a location picked out, or
at least have a location in mind.
Considering the land your container farm
business will rest on, is just as important
as learning about your zone area.
When using a Pure Greens Container
Farm, we recommend having an area of
land that is 55 feet by 12 feet, though
you will want to make sure that all sides
of the container area are accessible.
You’ll also want to make sure that your
location is on level ground, with no more
than a three-foot rise.
Because you’ll be growing crops and
produce within your container, it’s
important that the location you choose
is near an electrical source, has a water
access point within 50 feet, and is near
or can be outfitted with an internet
connection.
For both the electrical and water, be
sure you have these professionally
checked out by an expert, to ensure all
outlets and connections are in working
order and that your water source is free
of bacteria, pathogens, and other
harmful elements.

15. Container Farm
Design
Now we’re at the
exciting part and
that’s designing your
container farm!

16. The great thing about container
farming is that no two farms are alike.
Depending on the crops or produce
you plan on growing, your container
farm can be designed and customized
to fit your business requirements.
Pure Greens Container Farms are
made up with five crucial components
to get your farm up and running:
 A growing system, that includes
chambers, trays, racks, or shelves
 An irrigation system, complete
with pump, reservoir, nutrient
bins, vales, and piping
 A lighting system to help the
seedlings grow
 Atmospheric systems, with an air
conditioning and/or heating units
and ventilation
 Control & monitoring system, to
help with humidity, temperature,
and pH levels

17. Aside from these basic requirements, our Container Farms allow for deeper
customization and is set for what your business will grow. We have three
customizable growing systems you can choose from:
 Pure Micro System
 Best suited for independent growers who want to manage their own growing
environment, especially if growing crops like microgreens.
 Pure Essence System
 Ideal for starter farms by beginners or even experts. These systems are
maintenance friendly and provide DFT (Deep Flow Technique) tray racks.
These systems are good for growers of leafy greens and herb crops.
 Pure Volume System
 Ideal for commercial production to produce maximum yields. Our Pure
Volume system includes NFT System (Nutrient Film Technique) channels to
help recirculate nutrient rich water. These systems are also good for
growers of leafy greens and herb crops.

18. All of our containers come with a standard water hookup, HVAC, electrical
connections, and a main entry door. We also have three different layout options that
come with some additional components, such as grow rooms and seedling nurseries.
We also offer automated controlled environments using Growlink, a new generation
farming technology that uses sensors to monitor and measure multiple environmental
parameters like CO2, pH, TDS, nutrients, and water temperatures.

19. Training for Container Farming
As a beginning farmer and working on your
first container farm business, a lot of this
might seem intimidating.
No worries!
Once you have ordered and had your
container farm delivered, we provide one-
on-one training with one of our expert
growers.
Training can be done either on site at your
container farm business or at our office,
whichever is convenient for you.
Our expert growers are very knowledgeable
and can help with the following:
 Setting up and configuring your
container farm
 Setting up the GrowLink system and
mobile app
 Instructional walkthrough on how to
seed, transplant, and harvest your crop
or produce
 Instructional walkthrough on how to
plant your very first crop
 Instructional walkthrough on how to
test and maintain your farm
 Recommendations on supplies for your
farm and crops

20. How to Grow and Harvest
in Your Container Farm
Congratulations! You’ve just started a
container farm business!
You’ve discovered the types of customers you
want to market and sell to, you’ve looked into
and received your loan or grant to start your
container farm business, you’ve chosen a
location and a container design, and you’ve
gotten helpful training from a Pure Greens
growing expert on setting everything up and
configuring your container farm.
The next step is to start growing and then
harvesting your crops or produce.

21. You may already have an idea of the types of crops or produce
you want to grow or maybe you’re curious as to what else might
be out there. Let’s look at a few different types of growing
options for your new container farm business.
Growing leafy greens
Leafy greens are a variety of vegetable greens, usually within the lettuce family of
vegetable. Familiar greens like kale, mustard greens, bok choy, and arugula are
considered leaf or leafy greens.
These greens are rich in both flavor and nutritional value, making them staples for
many cuisines and recipes. They’re also a popular choice for container farming.
Growing lettuce
The salad staple, lettuce has a few different varieties, like romaine, butterhead,
bibb, and leaf. Lettuce is a high demand crop, meaning that your avenues of selling
open to consumers, grocers, and chefs.
Growing herbs
If the idea to start your container farm business was based on your love of cooking,
then herbs are the way to grow. Many popular herbs – like basil, chives, dill, and
thyme - typically grow in warm-weather climates, so year-round availability is
important for chefs and at home cooks.

22. When it comes to harvesting, there
are three stages of growth you
should be aware of:
• Seedling stage – planted
sprouts start growing and
you’ll begin to see the stalk
and leaves. At this stage,
roots are beginning to grow,
seeking out more nutrients as
it does.
• Transplant stage – here, you
will start to move the
seedling into your growing
system in the farm
• Harvest – your crops are
ready to be picked and eaten!

23. How to Sell
and Brand
Your
Container
Farm Business
You’ve come a long way since your first initial idea of
starting your container farm business.
You’ve learned how to create your customer persona,
you’ve discovered how to finance your first container farm,
you’ve set up your location and designed your container
farm, you’ve gotten hands on training from our Pure
Greens expert growers, and now, you have crops and
produce ready to be given out to the public.
You’ve reached the last steps to make your container farm
business a success – selling your produce and branding your
business. As the old saying goes, you’ve built it and now
you just need people to come.
But how do you do that?

24. While word of mouth to your friends and family is a great start, you want to be
able to get your name out there to consumers or other businesses. There are
many different avenues and opportunities you take with selling your crops and
produce.
Let’s look at a few examples.

25. How to Sell to Restaurants and Chefs
If you’re a foodie at heart, maybe your ideal customer is a chef, whether it be at
an upscale restaurant or small independent eatery.
Restaurants are looking to use and buy locally grown food that can be used in
their dishes. As we mentioned above with the different crops you could grow,
herbs are one such thing chefs love to buy.
To start selling your crops or produce to a restaurant chef, you’ll need to make
an appointment with the restaurant’s head chef to discuss the possibility of them
buying produce from you. Some restaurants also have small purchase areas or
marketplaces where people can buy products that are sponsored by the
restaurant.

26. How to Sell to Customers
at Farmer’s Markets
If you want customers to buy from you directly,
there are two paths you can take:
 Farmers’ Markets
 Produce shop
Farmers’ markets are retail marketplaces that allow
farmers to sell their foods directly to customers.
These can be anything from small, weekend pop up
events to larger, ongoing areas; the intention is for
people to buy locally fresh items, whether it be
fruits, vegetables, or even meat.
There were over 8,000 farmers markets listed in the
USDA Farmers Market Directory in 2017 and 100% of
any commerce done at a farmers’ market goes to
the farmer themselves. A farmers’ market stall or
stand might be a potential first step to getting word
out about your container farm business.

27. Another avenue for reaching
consumers is by creating a
produce shop where you sell
your crops or produce to the
customer themselves. Unlike
a farmers’ market, you
would need to rent or
purchase an office where
you could then sell your
product.
While this is certainly an
option, it might be a costly
one, as you would need to
choose an office location
and once more go through
the process getting
financing, as well as any
work needed to set up the
store.

28. How to Sell to Grocers
& Local Distributors
Perhaps you don’t want to sell to
restaurants or customers directly, but you
do want to ensure that they are receiving
your crops or produce. Your third option is
selling directly to your local grocer or
local distributor and then having them sell
to their customers.
For those just starting out selling their
produce, the best advice is to start small –
like at farmers’ market – to get the
experience in selling to the public; after
that, contacting small, independent
grocers is usually the next step as the
access to buyers is better and you can
start to develop a long term relationship
with the store and owner.

29. From here, your path can take any direction you’d like. If you’re happy with
utilizing the farmers’ markets and your independent grocer, you can continue this
model as long as you’d like; if you want to continue distributing your produce,
you’ve now gained the experience and credentials to speak to a larger store.
When setting your sights on larger grocers, especially chains like Fry’s/Kroger,
Walmart, Target, Safeway, etc., you want to make sure to set up an appointment
with the person in charge of their produce purchasing. You’ll want to ask what
produce they’re in need of, packaging and labeling preferences, and any product
codes they might prefer.
If you’re meeting in person, make sure to bring samples of your crops or produce
so they can get a taste of what they might want to buy; if speaking over the
phone, invite that person or team to visit your container farm so they can sample
the product on site.
Here’s a terrific guide on how to sell your produce to your local grocer.

30. How to Build
Your Brand
Online
Now that you’ve taken a path on who you’ll be
selling your product to, let’s look at how to brand
your container farm business. If you’ve been in
other business industries before getting into
container farming, you’ve probably heard this term
thrown about in the office or online.
But what does it mean?
Branding is a marketing term and practice where a
company creates a name, a symbol, or design that
is easily recognizable as belonging to that company,
making it distinctive from any other company. We
see branding everyday – from the distinct Nike logo
on your sneakers to the character Chester Cheetah
on that bag of Cheetos.
In our growing digital world, branding is an
important tool for businesses to get their names
out into the public consciousness. Thanks to social
media, websites, and online blogs, there are a
plethora of ways to get your container farm
business out to the public.

31. But branding isn’t just about
creating a Facebook page and
calling it a day.

32. Let’s look a few tips and
tricks to make branding your
business a success.

33. The
importance of
brand name
In 2019, Zendesk – a popular customer service software company –
conducted a survey that found that 87% of consumers said consistent
branding across all online and traditional platforms was important.
The results of this and other surveys help business better understand
what their customers want and how best to reach them. As mentioned,
our digital world has grown to such heights that it’s almost unheard of
for a business or company to not have a website, social media, or
online presence.
Devices like computers, smartphones, and even smart devices (like
TVs, Alexas, and Google assisted devices) have made it extremely easy
for customers to find an item or business they’re looking for. As a new
container farm business owner, you want to make sure that your
business can also be easily found.
First and foremost, you should have a website. A website is usually the
first place people will go in order to learn more about you and your
company.

34. Don’t worry if you don’t know the first thing about
building a website; there are a wide variety of free
website builders out there, especially for those
starting a business. Some popular ones include:
 WordPress
 Weebly
 Squarespace
 GoDaddy
 Wix
These are just five website builders, but there are
many more and all of them have different features
that might appeal to what you’d like your site and
other branding to look like. All of them have an
extensive range of templates and themes to
choose from, while others – like WordPress – allow
you to go even deeper into customizing your site
with plugins and add-on applications.

35. Because these are free site builders, make sure you investigate the different
features between their free service and their paid services. For instance, you
may only be limited to free themes and not the premium, or paid for, themes for
your free site or your web address may have the builder’s branding attached to
it, like farmersmarket.wordpress.com.
The good news is that most of these free builders also have a paid option, so if at
any point you want to update your site with more features, you can upgrade your
plan without your website changing.
After creating and building your website, you’ll next want to get yourself set up
with a company page on one or more of the popular social media networks. While
it may be tempting to just use your personal account, whether it be Facebook or
Instagram, it’s much better to have a separate page for just your container farm
business.

36. As with the website builder, choosing a social media network to use is personal
preference. Facebook is the most popular network, with close to 2.45 billion active
users per month, while 1.66 billion users use the platform daily.
If you use Facebook on a regular basis, then that should be the first social platform
you should start using. Setting up a business page on Facebook is very easy and you
can even tie it to your personal account to make login easy.
If Instagram is your platform of choice, you’re in luck – the platform is owned by
Facebook, so you can connect the two together for easier social media management.

37. Twitter and LinkedIn are also popular choices for businesses,
especially the latter as it’s considered a social media
platform for businesses and professional; there’s no set rule
on how many social media platforms you should be on, but
the general consensus is at least two, depending on the
demographics you want to market your container farm
business to.
Here’s an interesting article on how other farming businesses
are using social media and here’s another on using social
media for farmers 101.
One opportunity with social media we haven’t discussed is
the use of video. Video has been a very popular trend across
all of the social platforms and has even carried over to
popular video content channels like YouTube and Vimeo.
Video is a great way to bringing customers into your container
farm business by showing them the crops that are being
grown and even how to use certain types in everyday meals.
The great thing about social is that setting up your business
page is completely free, while setting up ad campaigns cost
as much as you would like to promote.
Each social platform has guides for businesses to start using
their ad campaign. Here’s Facebook’s guide on business ads.

38. Conclusion
In this guide, we walked you through the
beginning steps towards starting a container
farm business. We discussed how to create
customer avatars and personas, we looked at a
few different ways to get funding through
grants or loans for your container farm
business, we discussed how to decide on a
location for your container farm – along with
zoning laws and permits – and how to design it.
We looked at our helpful training with our
expert growers, which goes hand in hand with
starting to grow and harvest your crops or
produce.
And lastly, we looked at what’s involved with
selling not only the produce that you’re
growing, but how to sell your container farm
business itself to your customers.
Congratulations! You’ve started on a brand-
new path to starting your container farm
business! We’re so excited to see you enter
into a growing community and we wish you all
the best in your success.
Should you need any assistance along the way,
don’t hesitate to contact us either through our
website at http://puregreensaz.com or by
giving us a call at 602.753.3469.