Nick Martinelli's career transition from lawyer in Boston to running a Berkshire-based food hub isn't as an unlikely story as is seems. His fondness with the region began as a student at Williams College and he's had a life-long interest in agriculture. He soon realized that these two things had a lot in common. After moving to Richmond, Mass., he started Marty's Local, a food business that connects local farms, food producers and foods to local institutions. My wife and I moved to Richmond the previous spring and married in the fall. I grew up in western Mass and we both went to college in the area. We looked for a place to live that was close to her practice at Western Mass Endodontics in Pittsfield and what I was interested in. Richmond is close to all sorts of great towns. I was a lawyer for nine years in Boston and worked for Governor Patrick. I had been curious about farming for several years and had an opportunity to immerse myself in a year-long, hands-on program called Farm School in Orange, Mass. That was a way to learn about the practice of agriculture as well as the agricultural center of the economy. After that, I worked on different farms for a period of several months. When we moved here, I asked around for what was missing, what could be useful in the region as for as an agricultural resource. What I found was a gap in the infrastructure to support local farms and food producers in distribution. I've been developing Marty's Local for about a year and just started to do business in December. It's based on the food hub model. There are over 300 food hubs in the country. Food hubs handle distribution and tracking for local farms and food producers as opposed to a distributor that ships food from other parts of the world. We work on getting local food to local grocers, colleges, hospitals, resorts, schools, elder care facilities and museums. All these places order a lot of food every day and we can do a better job of bringing in local food. But we need a business to do that. There are a lot of logistics with every producer buying and connecting with each other in a way to make it more efficient. We work with farms in the Berkshire region as well as Pioneer Valley and Hudson Valley. We're still learning a lot about the area. We feel lucky there are so many great unmarked hiking trails here. We have a dog and love to take him out. We like to take friends to Thunderbolt Ski Trail on Mount Greylock in Adams, with our without snow; Stevens Glen in Richmond, and Perry's Peak in Richmond. And Richmond Pond is a really special and unique place. We keep exploring the area geographically and keep finding something new to do every time we do out. The diverse character of each of the small towns in the area is a real draw. We're excited to be part of the next generation of Richmond.
