Watsonville, Calif., farmer Dick Peixoto’s organic journey hasn’t been all blue sky and roses.

“It’s definitely more challenging than just sitting down and scheduling spray jobs each week,” says Peixoto, who will be honored as organic Grower of the Year at the Organic Grower Summit today, Dec. 5, in Monterey. “Organic takes a lot of work.”

Still, he says he would not consider going back to conventional farming.

“Lakeside is in a good place because of our crop diversity,” he notes. “If you’re looking for a range of specialty crops like our variety of Asian veg, you can’t go to the other growers, you have to go to Lakeside because we’ve got it all. A lot of our business is based on doing a lot of specialty items other people won’t bother with. We’re willing to have a diverse operation. We’ve become a valuable asset to buyers. That’s our future.

“Another advantage is, we don’t have a board – just myself and the guys working with me to critique my decisions and keep me going in the right direction. It means we can move fast.

“With all the pesticide regulations now, I feel that organics are the future,” he concludes. “I’m not going to say it’s the only way. Conventional guys have a business model, and I have a business model.

“I got into organic because I thought it was a viable business decision. Improving health and well-being for people and the earth was a byproduct of that business decision.”

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‘Three years of hell'

Making big operational changes to any farm entails risk. But moving a conventionally grown specialty crop farm to organic may be one of the biggest risks ever.

Even so, Peixoto made the leap some 30 years ago, converting 100- to 150-acre blocks of organic over the course of eight years. Today he’s happy with the decision, but he holds no illusions about the transition process.

“It can be three years of hell,” he says grimly.

What’s his advice for those who are considering organic today?

 “First, don’t look to put organic on poor quality land,” he says. “You need to transition good land.

“Second, it takes a long-term commitment to transition rental land. You can’t do it on a short-term lease,” he says. “Look for a landlord you can work with, that you have confidence in, one who is committed to what you’re going to do with their land, and who will be with you a long time.

“Third, you must have faith in what you’re doing. You need a business plan -- you can’t just go out there and hope for the best. Farmers tend to do things backwards, grow what they want to grow and then figure out how to sell it. I tell every grower, figure out what you can sell first, then grow that.”

Related:Organic grower recognized by Organic Grower Summit

Good management

Good management is another key, especially in a complex operation like Lakeside that grows 50 or more crops any given day. Each morning, he and Gonzalez meet with their nine team leaders to go over marching orders: side dressing, cultivating, weeding, fertilizing, watering, and anything else that needs attention.

“That’s followed by a harvest meeting where we fine tune, based on our sales needs and our labor capacity,” explains Gonzalez.

“Everything has a plan,” Peixoto says. “Before we started meeting like this, the company was dysfunctional. Nobody knew what the other guy was doing. Once we got all those guys in the same room where we’re all on the same page and talking, we’re able to coordinate.”

“I had a buddy who sat in on this meeting once and said he hadn't seen that much action in one place since he was in the Philippines during WWII, and they were coordinating airplanes coming in and out from three different sides,” Peixoto says with a laugh.

Tech help

Peixoto has considered commercial farm management software, but instead, the farm created its own workflow system using Google Drive. Now smart phones send information back and forth between sales, truck drivers, the cooler, harvest leaders, and other managers.

“Back in the day we relied on emails and phone calls, but since Google Drive came out we’ve modernized and everyone knows exactly what’s going on in real time,” adds Gonzalez. “We use it across the business from harvest to accounting, and it’s free.”

With few chemical pest control options, organic farmers like Peixoto look forward to new technologies that could help reduce hand labor costs and improve efficiency.

“I've seen technology move so fast that by the time you buy it, it's already outdated,” he explains. “There are laser weeders, and smart AI driven thinners out there now. Within the next two or three years you're going to have something for half the price and twice as good. So, we watch and see what other people are doing.

“You never want to be an innovator; You want to be an early adopter. The innovator pays for it, and the early adopter gets the benefit.”