Since 2013 Locavore has run and managed Left Field Market Garden on Kirkton Road in Neilston. We turned the site from a bare field on a windy hillside into an organic market garden which has produced a massive range of local organic vegetables over the years.

At different times we’ve kept chickens, pigs, bees and ducks and we’ve hosted events, visits and field labs. Over the years we’ve given tens of people a steady income growing local organic veg and hosted dozens of volunteers and wwoofers. Those that have worked the land brought their skills and imparted them on the land while taking away new skills and learnings for the next step in their journeys.

The site has always been changing as we’ve (usually) got better at what we do and have adapted how we use the site to better fit with the rest of the enterprise; growing veg for our shops and for our veg boxes. 

Time for Change

Now after more than a decade at Left Field we think we have learned most of what we can from growing on the site and it’s time for us to scale up our growing at our new veg hub at Barnhill Farm. Our market for local veg is so much bigger than we could ever produce at Left Field and so we are now tipping our toes into the works of growing vegetables by the acre.

At the same time it has always been our mission to help build a better and more resilient food system, and one really important part of that is having more local growers and producers in the food network so that there are more of us growing, selling and promoting local organic food.

We want to help more aspiring growers and producers get started and so we want to use Left Field to give people the access to land and markets that they might need to get going.

New Producer Plots

New producer plots are for those who want to start an organic land based enterprise on a small scale. We’re open to all ideas from growing a range of vegetables through to keeping bees, producing essential oils from herbs, or keeping quails for eggs. The area of land available could vary depending on your needs but generally won’t be more than 1 acre as we only have 4 acres in total. 

We’re not offering a forever home to a business. We want to offer a first step to get you started and imagine new producers may start their project part-time and test it out over 1-3 years on site before outgrowing their plot and setting up elsewhere.

The land is certified organic and it’s important to us that all new enterprises operate organically, you’ll need to keep some records for this and we can help you with that.

On the 4 acre site we also have some resources which might be useful to new enterprises including a shipping container, mains water, and small caravans which could be used for shelter or a field office. The site has a compost loo. There is no electricity.

Access to our markets is also something we might be able to help with and it’s likely we may want to buy your produce for sale in our shops. We do want all producers to have ideas about where else they could sell their products, we want you to help grow the market for local organic products and encourage more retailers and chefs to choose to get on board.

Beyond land, we currently do not have any dedicated resources to coordinate this project and our team won’t have lots of spare time to provide support. We are offering this opportunity because it’s our mission to increase local, organic food production. You will need to be prepared to work independently. 

Key Details

The first thing you need to do is put in an expression of interest using the form below. Please make your submission by February 24th.

Once we have your expression of interest we will be in touch to let you know if we think your idea could fit with the site and if it does we’ll arrange a site visit and meeting with you to talk through your idea further.

We should be able to have new enterprises getting started on site in March 2025.

Costs for the opportunity will be £500 per acre/year and this can be split over the year.