Denver’s Food System: Part Two

Not sure if you’ve heard, but Denver is the fastest-growing large city in the country. Blame the green stuff, or blame our beautiful mountains, 300 days of sunshine, or just great work-life balance—word is getting out about how awesome we are, and we’re getting bigger. More people means more people to feed—the challenge, is how to give all of Denver’s residents with the same access to responsibly-raised and sustainably-sourced proteins and produce.

Why is it important to have strong restaurants?

In a previous post, I talked about Denver’s Food System, and the task taken on by the City of Denver to develop the “Denver Food Vision 2030”. Did you know:

• 2,221 food system business establishments operate in Denver
• 56,000 employees work in the Denver food system—accounting for nearly 10% of all jobs in Denver
• $312 million of tax revenue is generated annually by Denver’s food system
• $7 billion of economic activity is generated by Denver’s food system annually

Source: Denver’s Food System: 2016 Baseline Report

The numbers make it clear—our restaurant scene has a profound impact on the culture and economic development of Denver.

Currently the City of Denver is in a planning stage, gathering information from community stakeholders in a series of local meetings around town. We recently sat in on one such meeting hosted by Chef Paul C. Reilly of Beast + Bottle. There, local chefs and restaurateurs met with Blake Angelo, Manager of Food System Development with the City of Denver, to identify the strengths and opportunities in addition to the barriers and challenges that faces Denver’s food system today—also known as a SWOT analysis for you savvy business strategists. Within that SWOT analysis, those in the restaurant industry identified several key takeaways that define what makes Denver great, and where we have room to grow.

Interested in learning what was identified as the Strengths and Opportunities, Barriers and Challenges to Denver’s Food System? Read on:

Strengths & Opportunities	Barriers & Challenges
Greater consumer demand and preference for eating out—particularly for local, healthy and source-identified foods Changing demographics—millennials want to eat good food and feel good about eating it too! New distribution models and technology available CO geography is diverse and reduces risk while increasing variety of locally sourced crops	Record rents—both for residents and restaurateurs! No distribution network for local farmers Seasonal availability—Colorado has a winter season that impacts crops Challenges recruiting and retaining trained workers in tight and competitive labor pool Rapid loss of farm/ranch land and agriculture water

Many cities are no stranger to these types of growing pains. Creating a plan now is key to Denver’s long-term success…and consider this, how will Denver look differently if we are successful?