Our Story

Liberation Farmers is what we call our permaculture farm, direct trade coffee roastery, and farm market kitchen in Almond, Wisconsin. Owned and operated by John Sheffy and Holly Petrillo, Liberation Farmers was founded in 2011 when John and Holly moved from their urban micro-farm in Stevens Point to 24 acres of glacial moraine in rural Almond. Both of us were swept up in the sustainable and local food movement and wanted to connect the dots between our backgrounds in ecology and forestry with our diet and passion for food culture.

Liberation Farm is a diversified mix of perennial food forests, annual gardens, and heritage animals raised on pasture. Food forests mimic of natural forests but are made up of layers of edible plants including fruits, nuts, flowers, tubers, and herbs. They make great habitat for pollinators, birds, and other wildlife too. We raise animals on pasture and feed locally sourced organic feed and hay. The animals feed the soil food web with their manure, which enhances the productivity and diversity of the farm. Our animals grow slower and spend more time foraging on pasture, which creates more flavorful and healthy meat and eggs. We grow a variety of annual fruit and vegetable crops for our own table and for sale, especially a few storage crops like potatoes, squash, garlic, and flour corn.

We offer a year round coffee and egg CSA, as well as a variety of chicken, pork, and goat meats year round at the Stevens Point Farmers Market. We host seasonal on-farm workshops. In the future we hope our farm will also offer fruits, nuts, and herbs!  

Liberation Coffee is our direct trade coffee CSA and coffee harvest trips to Mexico and Kenya. We travel to our host farmers each year to help pick and process the coffee and take volunteers to help, paying for the coffee a year in advance to give the farmers the capital they need to make investments in their farms. The coffee is grown in forest farms that use organic practices while also supporting diverse food production for our partner farms. We have built friendships with our host farmers over many years of harvest visits and coffee buying. Our farmers greatly appreciate our visits and our purchases help them make important investments in their farms each year, and they treat us as their extended family, which is quite an amazing honor that we hope we reflect to them also.