Ancestral Wisdom in Every Bite!

Our Origin Story: A Cooperative Kitchen 

Building Community

Three Stone Hearth was founded in 2006 as the nation's first Community Supported Kitchen. We developed a unique business model for food preparation and processing. For us, the ethos of "community" works on many levels.

Originally inspired by the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) model, in which customers support a farm by committing in advance to a share of their produce, our customers supported the kitchen by pre-ordering online, thus limiting speculation, risk and waste. As enamored as we are of the term "community supported kitchen," however, we have stopped using it because it can give the impression that we are a charitable organization or a kitchen rental facility. And as our business has grown over the years, we have evolved in the direction of a more conventional business model of online ordering, in-store sales and local delivery. Still, building community is at the heart of our mission.

As we grew, our brick & mortar store evolved from a couple of coolers holding extra products for people coming in to pick up their orders, to a vibrant part of our business that builds community in its own ways. Before the restrictions of covid, we hosted the artisanal food makers whose products we carry, and "herdshare" members would come and pick up their weekly milk and cheese from a local, raw milk dairyman. On Friday and Saturday we set up our Broth Bar and a communal reading table, with books from our library collection. As things have "returned to normal," we’ve started hosting our vendors to come in and sample their products, and are now hosting CSA pickups for Full Belly Farm and Frog Hollow Farm.

Before covid, we regularly held educational in-person events here, from lectures to hands-on workshops, Full Moon Feasts with guest speakers, and a Bone Broth Summit. While we have paused that programming, we adapted our popular Five Day Broth Detox and Five Week Food-Based Cleanse, developed and led by Functional Nutritional Therapist Joey Anderson, and offer both programs during the fall, winter and spring. Joey has also returned for “Ask the Nutritionist,” where she offers free mini-lessons and a Q&A in our store, which takes place once a month.

Education and community participation have always been part of the fabric of Three Stone Hearth. Over the years, hundreds of students, apprentices, interns, externs and volunteers have brought their knowledge and spirit to our work. Some experimented with bread baking, some with the alchemy of fermented beverages, and others brought traditional recipes and culinary knowledge from their families and indigenous cultures. Some have become staff members and worker-owners, while others have pursued advanced degrees in nutrition and public health, and have gone on to start similar or related businesses around the country.

Our commitment to reusable glass packaging is another way we build community through a participatory ecological practice. Most of our foods, and many other products we carry, are packaged in Mason jars, and we devote considerable resources to their reuse in order to avoid plastics and other single-use packaging. Involving other vendors, and our customers in that cycle of return and reuse builds community around our shared values of sustainability, and the material actions it takes to "walk the walk."

Our community is also rooted in relationships with many local farmers, ranchers, food producers and artisans who provide the ingredients we trust to put in our foods, and a growing selection of other products we sell. This community of shared values and mutual support is at the heart of a resilient and regenerative "integrity food system" (à la Joel Salatin), which we need now more than ever.

Come into our space, and feel the embrace!

A Cooperatively Owned and Run Company

TSH was founded by a cooperative of five worker-owners: Larry Wisch, Jessica Prentice, Porsche Combash, Catherine Spanger, and Misa Koketsu. 

There are many economic and social benefits to working cooperatively, and the cooperative model continues to gain popularity across the country, along with other models for worker-ownership. Three Stone Hearth is a member of NoBAWC, the Network of Bay Area Worker Cooperatives. 

Three Stone has never been an “off the rack” business model, and the creative challenge of organizing and running our business continues to be a work-in-progress. Our first five years were characterized by a mom-and-pop, bootstrapped energy -- though we had four moms and one pop -- exciting, inspiring and ever-evolving. The founders nurtured a bustling and open feel of community, a joy and passion for our work, a beehive in the best sense. Our organizational culture was deeply felt, but, as with many startups, organizational structure did not figure prominently in that model.

From Five "Mom and Pops" to a Family of Thirty-Five

As our business grew and a more long-term staff came together, the need for a greater structure also grew. This is a common challeng for many small enterprises, and we have strived to develop a structure that captures the alchemy, the entrepreneurial spirit, and the heart of what made us who we are. 

In 2014, we held our first worker-owner candidacy program to help employees learn the fundamentals of our business, develop the skills needed to assume an ownership role and to be openly and actively engaged in personal growth. At one point we had 19 worker-owners; by the time we reopened after covid, we were down to five, but we’re back up to nine now and plan to offer an opportunity for staff members to become new worker-owners every year. The co-founders have all moved on to other pastures, but the mission and values they brought to life here are in the hands of new stewards.