FMPP FY27 application · pre-drafted for owner review.

IronRoost Farms, Inc. requests FY27 funding under the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program (FMLFPP) (FMPP project type, Report #1732829) to expand Central Virginia’s market-development, capacity-building, and community-development-training rails for our vertically integrated hydroponic specialty-crop producer network. The FY27 cycle layers onto the same land base, walk-in dispatch cooler, and Mid-Atlantic buyer pipeline already proven under the 2026 poultry pilot — and the same CEA producer identity documented at our capability statement — by funding the market-development / capacity-building / community-development-training motion that connects our 2,000–3,500 sq ft indoor CEA footprint to a named, durable buyer pipeline.

Producer identity. IronRoost Farms, Inc. is a Virginia C-Corporation (SCC #12012225) headquartered at 2593 Cougar Lane, Locust Grove, Virginia 22508. The producer-of-record is Jean-Pierre Maldonado, Sole Director and Officer, IronRoost Farms, Inc. The operating model is a vertically integrated regional food platform: producer-side CEA capacity on Central Virginia land, a VDACS-licensed on-site processing and dispatch facility, a Tuesday / Friday refrigerated delivery cycle into the Richmond / Charlottesville / Southside VA corridor, and durable PO structures with named broadline distributors, institutional accounts, and farm-to-table restaurant accounts. The producer identity values below are reused from the IronRoost wholesale offer sheet letterhead and require no new entity documentation between FY27 and any subsequent cycle.

Phase 1 commercial line — hydroponic microgreens (Aug–Sept 2026 first-harvest window). The Phase 1 commercial line covers the four microgreen varieties broadline buyers consistently ask for and routinely struggle to keep year-round: sunflower (1 lb clamshell / 5 lb MOQ), pea shoots (1 lb clamshell / 5 lb MOQ), radish micro (1 lb clamshell / 5 lb MOQ), broccoli micro (1 lb clamshell / 5 lb MOQ), wheatgrass (1 lb clamshell / 5 lb MOQ), and mixed brassicas (a kale / arugula / mustard / broccoli rabe blend at 5 lb MOQ). Clamshell labels carry farm name, lot ID, and harvest date — usable as a “today’s harvest” stamp on the buyer’s menu insert. Pack sizes are 1 lb retail-ready clamshell, 5 lb food-service flat, 10 lb distributor flat. Net-30 default, Net-15 by request, ex-farm pricing, no broker markup on direct Phase 1 accounts. The Phase 1 floor at first commercial cycle is 200–400 lbs / week across the Phase 1 varieties, conservative on the equipment-baseline ceiling; Year-2 supply scales as the facility fill-rate increases.

FMPP-eligible scope — market development & capacity building. The FY27 award funds the market-development / capacity-building / community-development-training motion that AMS FMPP evaluates — the same motion mapped across the three AMS FMPP project types (Capacity Building, Community Development Training, Turnkey Marketing & Promotion) on the IronRoost FMPP FY27 readiness checklist. The Central Virginia CEA platform is the foundation: an indoor hydroponic specialty-crop producer footprint staffed by IronRoost personnel and contracted CEA operators, anchored on a VDACS-regulated processing and dispatch facility with an on-site ≤41°F walk-in cooler and a Tuesday / Friday refrigerated delivery cycle. The Gap fill is regional — [FILL — JP] named buyers per channel layer — and the Glen Allen closure that removed the largest independent fresh-cut leafy-greens handler inside our 100-mile radius sharpened the timing of the FY27 cycle. The mid-Atlantic buyer pipeline is already in motion on the same four channel layers the SCBGP 2027 draft cites: PFG / Saval / Wholesome at the broadline-distributor layer, UVA Dining / VCU Dining / Riverside Regional / Sentara at the institutional layer, farm-to-table restaurant direct accounts at the chef layer, and CCCPS at the K-12 farm-to-school layer. The FY27 award funds the supplier-side brand-build, training-event, and partner-development motion that converts that buyer pipeline into recurring PO volume for our producer network — exactly the motion AMS FMPP funds and exactly the motion named in the FMPP FY27 readiness checklist, Section 5 Project Narrative skeleton, across the three AMS FMPP project types.

The three objectives below map to the three AMS FMPP project types identified on the IronRoost FMPP FY27 readiness checklist (Section 5): Capacity Building, Community Development Training, and Turnkey Marketing & Promotion. Each objective carries a numeric baseline, a numeric target, a data-source owner, and a verification cadence. The owner confirms the exact pairings against the FY27 NOFO on the day the NOFO opens; the AMP FMPP project-type classifications already align with the readiness-checklist scaffolding.

The project period divides into four FMPP-eligible quarters. Each quarter maps to a discrete deliverable with a named responsible party. The named Mid-Atlantic buyers in the Q3 channel-build-out quarter are pulled from the four pre-staged buyer outreach letters: PFG / Saval / Wholesome at the broadline-distributor layer (broker-outreach letter), UVA Dining / VCU Dining / Riverside Regional / Sentara at the institutional layer (RRS foodservice letter), farm-to-table restaurant direct at the chef layer, and CCCPS at the K-12 farm-to-school layer. The owner confirms which of those named buyers appear in the final FY27 NOFO scope on the day the NOFO drops; the draft below carries the full set as default. The match-gate milestone (25% cost-share documentation complete) lands inside Q2 so the submission package is match-eligible on the day of submission.

AMS FMPP FY27 follows the standard federal cost categories: Personnel, Fringe, Travel, Equipment, Supplies, Contractual, Other, Indirect. FMPP is a federal grant administered by AMS; IronRoost’s match dollars are funded by the operating-capital slice of the seed deployment waterfall documented on the Financials page — operating capital, not debt. The match-amount column on each row below is the IronRoost cash / in-kind share; the AMS FMPP request column is the federal share. Match / cost-share layering. AMS FMPP requires IronRoost to commit at least 25% of the total project cost as match — cash plus documented in-kind contributions of facility use, equipment, and labor, each substantiated with a valuation methodology in this Project Narrative. The Match column below is layered cash first from the seed deployment waterfall, then in-kind documentation for facility access, equipment, and labor — the layering pattern documented on the FMPP FY27 readiness checklist, Section 4. Every dollar cell below is a [FILL — JP] marker — the FY27 NOFO ceiling is not yet published, and the cost-reasonableness sentence on each cost category pairs with the buyer-channel commitments already documented in the broker-outreach letter so the budget pairs with the Section 1 narrative by construction.

Cost-reasonableness paragraph. Every dollar in the table above is backed by a one-sentence reasonableness justification in the cost-reasonableness column: market-rate anchoring on personnel and fringe, prior-bid references on equipment, fair-contract framework language on contractual, and explicit valuation-methodology language on every in-kind line so the FMPP reviewer can substantiate the 25% match without estimating. The match column is funded by the operating-capital slice of the seed deployment waterfall documented on the Financials page (no new debt) and reaches the FMPP match minimum (25%) line-by-line — the threshold documented on the FMPP FY27 readiness checklist, Section 4. The indirect rate is cited verbatim — 10% de minimis per 2 CFR 200.414 unless the FY27 NOFO specifies otherwise. State any negotiated indirect cost-rate agreement (NICRA) in lieu of de minimis if IronRoost has one on file at the day of submission.

The three outcome cards below map to the three AMS FMPP project types — Capacity Building, Community Development Training, and Turnkey Marketing & Promotion — documented on the IronRoost FMPP FY27 readiness checklist, Section 5. The data-collection language below is the recommended default and pairs with the Section 3 work-plan quarters by design. The owner confirms which project type (or hybrid combination) the FY27 NOFO emphasizes; the cards are designed so each card stands alone if the project is classified as a single project type.