Dock Member Series: Heather Vandenengel
Heather Vandenengel is the Marketing and Sales Coordinator for the South Island Farm Hub, helping farmers get their local produce to market!
1. Tell us a bit about your organization: how do you make a positive impact in the community?
The South Island FarmHub is a local food aggregator and distributor--we partner with local farms and food producers to sell their products on our online farmers market year-round. I think we make a positive impact by providing another source of revenue for local farms and making it easy for community members to buy local food, even if they can't make it to the farmers market every week. We're also really proud of the Farmbucks program, which subsidizes the cost of local food for schools, charities and community organizations like Our Place and the Victoria Women's Transition House.
2. We’d also love to know a bit about you! What drove you to get involved in this work?
I lucked out, as it's a perfect hybrid of all my past work and interests. I worked as a writer and editor for years, but always enjoyed food and farming, and worked on vegetable farms in Salt Spring and Saanich the past two years. I wanted to stay in that world while also using my writing/marketing skills, and Marketing and Sales Coordinator at the FarmHub seemed like the ideal opportunity.
3. What was it about theDock that encouraged you to become a member?
That my new job had an office here! J/K, I would have joined anyway because I love the sense of community--it's a very pleasant place to work, and when you mostly work remotely, it's really nice to have people to chat with when you need a break.
4. Could you describe a challenge you’ve faced that theDock has helped you overcome?
What to eat for lunch on Wednesdays (Salad Club!). But also, I'd say adjusting to an office job after a couple years of very physical, in-person work on farms. I was nervous about feeling isolated while working mostly alone on my computer all day, but being here has helped tremendously.
5. What is a piece of advice you would offer to another person or group doing similar work? Feel free to reference the challenge you just mentioned, another you have overcome, or some other advice altogether!
Find a way to have fun! No job is fun all of the time of course, but I think there are always ways you can bring more joy into your work, especially with communications.
6. In your mind, how do you see theDock-of-the-future supporting you and other great organizations as an older and wiser Social Impact Hub?
Perhaps community roundtables around different themes? I'd love to have a food systems roundtable. I'd also love to see more Dock members try out ordering with the FarmHub--there's a discount for members and we deliver here every Wednesday :)
7. One last thing: please share something (it can be either fun or serious) that you’d like people to know about you?
I came in third place in a shuffleboard tournament this summer (court shuffleboard that is--none of that tabletop nonsense!).
Learn more about South Island Farm Hub!
Check out their website here.
Interested in becoming a Dock member?
Learn more about our membership options!