Full case study report: Kolonihagen - Norway

Summary

It is the distribution of organic boxes to private household in and around the Oslo region, which is the focus of the case Kolonihagen box schemes and its value chain in the Healthy Growth project. The company’s location is in Oslo. Kolonihagen was established in 2004 “by accident” – according to the interviewee. JonFrede Engdahl the founder, who originates in the advertising industry, was given the assignment to publish a book on cooking organic food. When meeting enthusiasts producing and working with organic food, as well as tasting the difference between TINE (farmer cooperative) butter and Røros Dairy butter he understood that these products were more interesting and varied than conventional food. Engdahl’ s wife, a real estate broker and Engdahl’s sister quit their job, and started to travel in Norway to collect organic food and to pack food boxes in their own home. They had little knowledge, but learnt by doing. They also started their own bakery to provide their boxes with bread. This was however too productive so they also needed a bakery outlet in addition to the boxes. The outlet also sell other food. The box scheme arrangement grew steadily - and in 2012 they also started distributing dinner boxes. This is now the largest product – and count for 50% of the total turnover of Kolonihagen. Kolonihagen box schemes sold about 1200 boxes in March 2014, (1000 private, 200 business), 400 of these were dinner boxes. In January 2015, about 1700 boxes were sold each week. The last 2-3 years have been important growth years correlating with developments in the organic / local / specialty food market, normalizing towards modern young people and “ordinary” people. Ethical and organic foods are seen as “modern”. Now Kolonihagen is big enough to secure delivery for producers, meaning suppliers can develop with Kolonihagen.