As Last Paid Editors Depart, Modern Farmer’s Future in Doubt

"Buyer Beware" indeed. This is a very long story, but basically I received a copy of the Spring 2016 issue and somehow paid for it. But I never ordered a subscription, could find no record of payment on me bank card statement, and could not get ANY information out of the magazine or their "customer service"—which they have "farmed out" (pun intended) to Iowa.

Their subscriptions are handled by a distributor (or something) located god-knows-where who has no address or website and is reachable ONLY be phone or email. but that's a joke since they are impossible to get a hold of. And so forth…

March 28, 2015: Buyer Beware: I asked for and received a cancellation of my subscription. Deposited the MF check, and today bank contacted me because the drawer had stopped payment. I was of course assessed a charge by my bank. A stopped payment check cannot be resubmitted for deposit so I'm out the subscription "refund" and the bank fee. Not a promising sign.

I bit when this came out. Sadly, it wasn't worth it. I'm not sure what the point of this publication was. There was little practical utility for a farmer at any scale, particularly small and homestead - Mother Earth News, Hobby Farm, and regional farm bureaus provide much more substantive information. As for the reporting, yes it was well done, but unfortunately the real reporting felt like it was fighting for a place at the table (of contents) full of hipster wannabe farmer stories.

As a lifelong urban dweller, I really enjoyed this magazine and am sorry to see it go. It made farming and related topics accessible for someone like me with very little knowledge of where our food comes from, and also provided important insight into food-related political and economic issues.

No matter how urban one may be, this a beautiful and informative periodical and it's a shame to see it go.

Discussions about local food need to continue if we are going to make any changes to the current food system. As the Publisher of Edible Boston, I am one of approximately 90 Edible Community magazines across the country dedicated to local food. We believe the only way to keep the local food economies growing is to have them covered by individuals in the community. This is where we have found we can be successful.

"Effete urban farmer's markets?" - NYT that is appalling.
Sure the magazine was perhaps precious and unsure in it's aim and understanding of what's really going on - but "effete"? - farmer's market are robust and deserve our support / and the support of the NYT. Go start yr own magazine then. And applause to the Edible Boston publisher and all the other Edible franchises.

As another real and small family farmer - organic vegetables and grass fed beef are my wares - I'm surprised I never head of Modern Farmer until the first article here in the Times a couple months ago about its lingering problems. Perhaps that is because ACRES USA has all the information I could possibly use in expanding and improving my business. I wonder how many potential subscribers felt the same way.

I'm worried about the future of our food, too. I do hope the magazine returns. It was encouraging a new generation of people to take up the mantle of farming. Locally grown, American food needs our help. Together, with the help of native bees (not honey bees) we can all support local farmers.

I'm glad I haven't thrown out any of my copies of it! I hope they can figure something out.

Been a subscriber since Issue One. Always looked forward to getting it in the mail and said to my wife each time "there's no way this magazine stays in business" with its tiny target audience and slick production. Bummer. Will be missed.

Join Hobby Farmer on Facebook. Great articles for the Modern Farmer crowd

This article seems so negative and I hope that new people will be found who will carry on-- we need new ideas in farming and there are people of all ages who are interested in how to grow healthy food . Bill and Melinda Gates were interviewed last week on Charlie Rose show and they are concerned about growing food. Hope the magazine will catch on again.

As of December, circulation of Modern Farmer had risen from about 10,000 to perhaps 17,000, according to Ann Marie Gardner... and Frank Giustra.

We were speaking about the need for addition capital.

Sad to hear this but I'm not surprised. Right after reading the article about Modern Framer and Ann Marie Gardner in The New Yorker, I enthusiastically went online and subscribed. As a person who loves to get her hands dirty, even if it only means an urban sidewalk container garden, I fell in love with Ann Marie's ideas and her hipster gloss on earthy matters. Shortly after I subscribed, however, I read that she had left Modern Farmer and I could hear the death knell sounding. Still, I'm glad I got one issue to treasure and who knows, maybe Anne Marie and the chickens and the donkeys and the goats will get their best photogenic faces immortalized once again in a farm-to-table new testament.

I thought this was a story about a magazine offshoot of Portlandia. It wasn't was it?

Good grief. First, the New Republic, and now, Modern Farmer. I don't know if I can go on living without these publications as they were originally intended to be.

Is Tina Brown available? Perhaps she could become the new editor of the Modern Farmer, and rename it The Daily Feast...

It may come as a shock, but some people who raise chickens for a living actually do give a flip about the dairy situation in the Philippines. The agrarian life does not preclude an interest in global affairs or social justice.

"Modern Farmer," however, was a very silly magazine.

if you'd spoken to anyone in Hudson - like, the realtors, who know everything? - you'd know that Gardner has taken a well-paying media job in Manhattan. she's the laughing stock of Hudson for moving up there, blowing her horn loudly, and decamping quickly. but not before she got the New York Times to do a large, self-verifying story about her, and her 'movement' (Penelope Green). is this coverage 'branded content,' or real reporting? i love the fact that everyone in this story except the goat had a public relations person speaking for them.

This is not a surprise. I've been a subscriber (well, for the first year). We are real farmers, not the city interpretation of what a farmer is. The demographic for this magazine was likely not a farmer but wannabe farmers or newer, younger farmers of which there are many but probably not enough to buy the magazine or who even found it all relatable to them. It wasn't a romantic, sentimental magazine but neither was it practical for most farmers.

Kurt Andersen has it all wrong; everyone I know LOVES this magazine - including organic farmers. Modern Farmer was anything but "nitty-gritty and old-fashioned" and referring to it as a "hippie magazine" is demeaning and shows his bias. Did Mr. Andersen even read this magazine? It's articles were cutting edge, interesting and informative often raising important issues and questions. It's spotlight on the international scene was fascinating and inviting and even it's advertisements and gift suggestions sent me to the internet more than once. And yes, farmers actually do purchase what others here refer to as "pretentious clothes" such as $160 Muckboots. There is absolutely no replacement for the fine work that was done by the Founder and Editorial staff of this magazine. There's more to this story than what is being said; it seems almost as if the Canadian Financier is seeking retribution against the Founder and Editors. And other readers, it is not at all productive to be speaking about a past TV show that has absolutely nothing to do with this magazine.

I've been expecting this publication to tank--actually collecting its issues-- because it is (or was) such a clumsy hybrid of farm and chic. Any seasoned magazine reader could see that it was a little too groady for city-chic diners and WAY, way too citified for real farmers. Even the few who do leave city culture to run farms have no use for the expensive, pretentious clothes and tools advertised. As a city food-lover myself, but one who has worked on organic farms, I was embarrassed to think what real farmers, faced with gritty realities of backbreaking work and little money, would say about Modern Farmer.

Does anyone remember the original Modern Farmer? It was a TV show that started the broadcast day in NYC. It came on before the farmer Grey cartoons that started at 7:00 AM. Mostly short informative films by the Dept. of Agriculture. My favorite episode was about wheat rust.Seriously, that episode was a thriller.

"effete"

how so?
I do believe your bias is showing

The Modern Farmer article in the New Yorker last week was the biggest waste of space I've ever seen in that magazine. I couldn't keep a straight face--it read like it belonged in The Onion!

Oh dang! I loved this publication!

I'm less interested in what the publisher's plans are, and more interested in what the former editor's plans are.

When I saw the headline I immediately assumed that this referred to a magazine incarnation of "The Modern Farmer," the TV show that New Yorkers (and I assume other viewing audiences) watched on early Saturday mornings in the 1950s when they woke up before the cartoons (and it was the only thing on). For a kid growing up in the NY suburbs, this was our only taste of the world of agriculture and farming and, in hindsight, I'm glad my TV addiction expanded my horizons. It is clear that the modern "Modern Farmer" has nothing to do with that early "classic" television series. Still, the headline evoked memories that had lain dormant for many decades.

I had a subscription and enjoyed the magazine. It was a bit precious and the glamor shots of sheep were a little over the top but it was fun.

Random comment. When i was a kid, some 55 years ago, Modern Farmer was a TV show at about 6 a.m. on Saturday mornings. i watched it all the time. One episode that i have never forgotten had a cow which had had 'portholes' put in it's stomach so that they could figure out how it digested different foods. that image is burned in my brain.

Sounds like something that would appeal to Manhattanites who buy weekend houses and suddenly embrace "the country" in a way that is so anally quaint and picture perfect that it's laughable. You can spot their houses as you drive down any country road within two (or these days even three) hours of the City. And whom do they wind up socializing with in "the country"? Why their fellow Manhattanites, of course...

For those interested in what is happening in the local food space I recommend you check out the 90 Edible Magazines in North America. I am sorry to hear that another magazine who has tried to cover this space is closing but do believe it has to do with how they went about covering it. As the publisher of Edible Boston I would like to point out that in order to truly understand a local food community you need to be part of it, not just come in to cover a story.

I had a subscription to this magazine but soon tired of it. A different animal photograph for EVERY cover got very old. Too much style, too little substance!