I've been getting produce from It's Organic for a few months now and have been happy with the service. I was surprised to see such a low average rating on yelp.
Seems like a lot of negative responses have more to do with people not following the instructions on the website /having trouble with Groupon (i.e. not cancelling before a certain cut off date), or not actually liking the idea of eating from a CSA box (i.e. produce eventually goes bad, you need to eat it).
If you like the idea of eating food that is local (mostly), in season (mostly), and fresh, I recommend using It's Organic.
I get the large, mixed box every month. These are my thoughts:
Pros:
**You are allowed to list up to 6 or so "skip" items on the website. As far as I can tell, this is pretty novel as far as CSA services go. Usually you get NO say whatsoever, so I'm THRILLED that they are offering this. For example-- in my second box I got 1.5lbs of russet potatoes. I prefer sweet potatoes to russet so I went ahead and listed "russet potatoes" under the "no" list online. Now whenever they go to pack russet, they see this-- and I get sweet potatoes (or whatever else they have) instead! It's GREAT.
** The greens are BEAUTIFUL. I always look forward to the greens the most. Swiss chard, rainbow chard, kale, mustard greens, etc... they are always very fresh and gorgeous. If they did a mini weekly box of greens only I would sign up in a heartbeat!!
**You get awesome delicious produce delivered to your doorstep once a week (or every other week). No trip to the grocery store-- how great is that?
** You're supporting local farmers and eating in-season produce, so there is less energy wasted importing goods from far away.
**If you need a break from the service (going out of town, etc) you can go online and give them the dates you are away and they will stop all boxes during that period. It takes 5 seconds to set that up, and it's even easier to resume when you get back (either it resumes automatically the week after, or you can hit a button that says "I'm back early" or something to that effect). I've already done that twice and it's worked great.
**They always deliver on-time/consistently. I like that they re-use the cardboard boxes (you just leave it out on the doorstep).
** There's a handy little sheet that comes with each box that gives some basic recipes/tells you how to best store your veggies/fruit and gives some interesting nutritional information about a product that's in season.
Cons:
**Occasionally I will get something that will go bad within a day or so (meaning it was already past its prime when it was packed), or I'll get a sour orange but that has only happened maybe twice. That's about the same chances of coming home from the grocery store with an accidental dud, so I don't mind.
** Once I got a pumpkin that had a "organic, mexico" sticker on it, but I imagine they were low on stock that week and needed some extra produce for the boxes. It seems like most everything else is local.
Note about eggs: they are fairly prices and I've had them delivered once--- the quality is good. The eggshells seem a TAD on the thin side for free-range chickens. It would be helpful if It's Organic could upload to the website where these eggs come from and clarify if they are from pastured chickens (meaning, they are outside all day). Free-range is an empty phrase these days...
Overall: A+
I'm thrilled with It's Organic and look forward to many more delicious boxes of food in the future. I'm glad to be supporting local agriculture and am happy to have this service available! read more