Dunton Family Farm News

What's Happening Around the Farm as well as a Soapbox for head farmer, Mike Dunton

Socializing

Things have changed a lot since the World Wide Web was young and we created our first company web site.  If you remember, web pages back then were basically nothing but glorified brochures and communication between you an I was limited to the U.S. Mail, telephones and email.  Social media services have changed that.

I have to admit that I was reluctant to embrace social media.  It was not because I didn’t see its potential or value, nor do I have a “tin foil hat” mentality towards them.  My main reason is that I am stretched pretty thin around here with all of my duties and responsibilities and do not have a lot of spare time.  I am the type of person that tries to do things right and I just did not want to quickly set up the service and not use it.

So in my “spare time” over this past week, I got our YouTube Channel (www.youtube.com/VictorySeeds) and Facebook Fan Page (www.facebook.com/VictorySeeds) set up and connected to our Twitter account (twitter.com/VictorySeeds).  I also figured out how to stay in contact even when I am out in the field or away from the farm using my smart phone.  The next goal will be to get the blog to send out a post to Twitter and Facebook.

Technology is cool when used for a good purpose.  In this case, these social media tools allow us all to communicate and keep in touch.  Kind of like the 21st Century version of chatting over the garden gate.  I look forward to learning these tools better and hope that you have patience with me as I work through the learning curve.  If you are a Facebook user, please “Like” us and as you are so inclined, please leave a comment from time to time.  If you use Twitter, please “Follow Us” ad if one of our tweets is interesting to you, please retweet it to your followers.  As always, your support is greatly appreciated!

posted by Mike in Company News and have No Comments

First Blog Entry’s Are . . .

. . . always a let down to read.  They usually are either obvious, boring, self-serving, amateurish, a waste of time, or some combination of all of the above.  This post will likely not disappoint you in that manner.

Yes, this is the first post of what I hope will be a long tradition.  I am a fairly disciplined person and if this communication tool proves to be worthwhile (and by worthwhile I mean not a waste of my time and yours!), then I expect that this will remain a good place for you to visit from time-to-time to check-in and see what is happening around the Victory Seed Company and on the farm.

My initial idea, and I reserve the right to change my mind, is that although I am the founder of this organization and therefore I suppose that what I write here is “official company information,” I intend for the tone to be casual and at times, personal.  That means that the opinions I present here are my own and not of everyone else at the company.  But how people who work here think is a topic for a future post.  :)

This public blogging is actually a leap for me.  I am of the generation who sported bumper stickers with such slogans as “Question Authority[1] and have always worked hard at living a private life.  Even when my work is very visible and public.  If you have read our privacy policy at Victory Seeds®, then you know that I truly believe that privacy is the cornerstone upon which all other freedoms are laid.

So why, you are asking yourself (Right?  You are asking yourself?), is this private guy talking to me in this way?  Well, I guess that as I near a major age-related milestone (and you will just have to speculate on which one), I have decided to take this step at trying to better communicate with all of you folks that have been supporters of our seed variety preservation work since the beginning, or even since yesterday.

Those of you that have been following and supporting and spreading the word about the Victory Seed Company for the past decade plus, also know that I have never taken on an active, public or visible role as a figurehead.  From the beginning, I always tried to remain in the background and let the work, the quality, and our reputation stand on their own.  Part of this stems from being a student of history.  I have learned that certain business patterns occur when organizations of any kind are focused on one person.  They often never survive the death of the “leader” and even if they do, rarely make it through two generations before they are sold or they fold.[2]

From our beginning back in the late 90s, even when I was basically a one man operation, I have felt that this work of preserving and protecting plant diversity is bigger than myself.  With this philosophy in mind, I have run the organization with the plan that it will continue long after my inevitable (but hopefully decades away) death.  This is why I don’t throw my photograph all over the web site (if you look hard you will find some) or shamelessly self-promote myself.

So yes, I am now moving into the 21st Century and will use social media tools like Facebook and Twitter and even this blog.  But I will not use these tools for self promotion.  It will always be to focus your attention on such topics as the importance of gardening for personal security and freedom, the attacks on these freedoms from forces we should all be aware of, and primarily to further your awareness of our work preserving and protecting open-pollinated, heirloom, heritage, non-hybrid, non-GE, non-GMO, or whatever other name you want to assign to the good old seed varieties that have been quickly disappearing over the last several decades.

As always, thank you for supporting our seed preservation work with your orders and for your word-of-mouth recommendations to all of your gardening friends and family.

~Mike~

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[1] – While often attributed to Timothy Leary, this is presumably an age old concept.  Even Benjamin Franklin once said, “It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority.”

[2] – It should be noted that there are many seed companies currently operating that have very old, well established names.  All of them, with no exception, are in name only.  None have survived and are being run under the guiding principles of the founders principles.  This is not in any way saying that they are bad or doing anything wrong.  It is just stated to emphasize a point about company continuity dynamics.  If you are interested, you can read some select (ones that I have had time to research and write about) company histories at the Victory Horticultural Library.

posted by Mike in Company News and have Comments (2)


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