Kickstarter campaign might fund Tom and Maren Beard's vision of a rural pizzeria

Maren and Tom Beard traveled to Northern California in February for a four hour cooking class at Mugnaini imports, where they are purchasing their oven (all photos courtesy of Luna Valley Farm FB page)

Who doesn't love a good pizza on a Friday night surrounded by family and friends? That's the experience Tom and Maren Beard plan to bring to their Luna Valley Farm this fall.  The Beards are using a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign to help make their dream of hosting a rural pizzeria on their farm a reality.

Kickstarter helps artists, musicians, filmmakers, designers, and other creators find the resources and support they need to make their ideas a reality.  Since Kickstarter's launch on April 28th, 2009, 13 million people have backed a project, $2.9 billion has been pledged, and 121,776 projects have been successfully funded. https://www.kickstarter.com/about?ref=nav.

"We visited three 'pizza farms' last year and absolutely fell in love with the concept and thought it would be a perfect fit for the Decorah area," says Maren.  "We love to bring people together over good food and especially food that we raised ourselves. We love to farm. We love to cook and we love to share our farm with people. We have owned our farm for three years and are always looking for creative ways to diversify our income while connecting more eaters with agriculture."

Tom is the full time farmer at Luna Valley Farm. He was born and raised at his parents' farm just up the road. Maren works full time at Luther College as an Assistant Director in the Center for Sustainable Communities, overseeing campus sustainability initiatives related to energy, waste, food (local food procurement, college farm), transportation and reporting. Maren spends her days in town, helping with chores and planning for the pizza farm on evenings and weekends.

The Kickstarter campaign for Luna Valley Farm began on March 1st and runs through this Friday, March 31st. Their goal has been to raise $15,000 for the project--and they've raised $15,389 as of Tuesday evening.  Money raised above their goal will help fund their efforts as the initial start up costs will be over $75,000. They received additional funds through the Biz Booster Challenge and plan to take out a loan for any remaining balance.

Maren says, "We always knew we had really kind and generous family and friends, but we have been humbled by the response we have received to our invitation to support this venture. People from all across the country have been sending us letters, telling us how excited they are about this idea and how they can't wait to visit. We have had many friends that we haven't talked to since college, support us on Kickstarter."

They will kick off this year with a short season beginning on September 1st and then plan to reopen in 2018 and run from May until October.

Future plans include applying for a special Class C beer and wine license so they can offer drinks to their customers, including possibly some beers from a Decorah brewery. 

Maren summed up their experience by saying, "The cool thing about Kickstarter is that we now have this community of people cheering us on and are excited about this new business. They will be here to support us when we open in September. It has been really fun to watch the 'buzz' around this idea and we are working hard to make it happen."

Check out their kickstarter campaign at: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2076093430/bring-wood-fired-pizza-to-luna-valley-farm?ref=user_menu

Luna Valley Farm has a farm friendly atmosphere

Children can wander around the farm, exploring and checking out farm animals

Maren Beard has loved learning and taking in new information and loves building community in this new business adventure

Luna Valley Farm borders Canoe Creek