The arrangement required an initial investment in rented refrigerated space, reusable crates, and scheduling software. Victoria insisted the company finance its share through a documented pilot budget rather than burying the costs in her discretionary account. The farmers put forward a modest membership contribution and elected a steering committee with rotating seats. Ethan agreed to serve on it for one year, provided someone else kept the minutes, because he knew from experience that he was terrible at writing down what people said while trying to imagine what they would do next.
Amara Reed became the committee's chair. She had studied agricultural economics before returning to run the vegetable farm she'd inherited from her mother, and she could move from crop rotations to accounting with an ease Ethan envied. At the first planning session, she pinned a large paper map to the wall and marked every participating farm with a different colored sticker.
"We're not asking anybody to pretend this is easy," she told the room. "We're asking whether doing it together makes more sense than everybody failing separately in the same expensive ways."
Several people laughed, relieved that someone had named the problem without softening it. Walter Beckett volunteered one of his trucks for the early route tests. June offered the rear loading area of her feed store as a temporary staging point, though she demanded that nobody block the customer entrance during the morning rush. A mechanic from town offered to inspect the trailer brakes at cost.
Victoria attended as a partner rather than the person directing every decision. Ethan watched her listen while farmers challenged the company's standard contract language, and he noticed the extra effort it required her not to take control whenever a discussion wandered. On one occasion, Daniel interrupted Amara to explain why a proposed pickup window wasn't feasible. Victoria let him finish, then turned back to Amara and asked whether she wanted to respond. Ethan saw the difference that small gesture made.
In February, the regional board of Hayes Global reviewed the pilot. Daniel presented the costs honestly and warned that the first season might not deliver the return some directors expected. Another executive, Jonathan Kessler, asked why the company should risk resources on a low-margin project with so many unknowns when a larger distribution acquisition was already in progress. Victoria could have appealed to her father's legacy or made a sentimental argument about struggling farmers. Instead, she showed the route models, the reduced empty miles, the prospective buyers, and the risk limits.
"It's an experiment with measurable terms," she said. "We establish the cost ceiling in advance. We don't require exclusive supply agreements. We evaluate the pilot after a full growing season, not after the first inconvenient week."
"And the fact that you're personally acquainted with a farmer in the program?" Jonathan asked.
Victoria did not flinch. "That relationship is disclosed. Ethan Brooks does not receive preferential purchase pricing or decision rights from Hayes Global. The association sets its own membership requirements, and our contracting review is being handled independently of me. If the project doesn't meet its operational standards, we don't pretend otherwise."