Meet Lindsay Brooks | Director of Sales

We had the good fortune of connecting with Lindsay Brooks and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lindsay, as a parent, what have you done for you children that you feel has had the most significant impact?
As a single mom to two children I am well aware that every decision I make will impact them in some way. There are two things I have done as a parent that I see as the most important in regards to impacting my children.

The first is always growing in my career. I want them to see a mom that is strong, driven, hard working, and that never settles for a career that doesn’t bring me joy. I want the same for them! I love feeling challenged in my career and the passion that comes with the drive to face it head on daily. There is strength in that choice and I want them to take that with them on their journeys to finding their own careers and I hope that my strength as a hard working woman drives them in their futures. I am so proud to be in an industry that focuses on sustainability and innovation that will directly impact their generation and I constantly try to teach them why it is so important.

The second important thing I have done as a parent that has impacted my children has been to intentionally build a life that is safe and happy. Seems simple but harder to do than one might think as a single mom doing it alone! It was a rocky road getting here but we are all proud of where we are and the life we have built! I had a long battle with domestic violence that I proudly escaped. Our life is a reflection of the strength, drive, and determination that it took to get us here but also of the love that I have for myself and my children. The only option was to do better and make the life I wanted my kids to have!

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I love how I got to where I am in my career because it all happened so unexpectedly! I graduated college with a degree in English, History, and Sociology and moved to Charleston SC the month after. I got a job working as an admin at a local restaurant and found a love for the farm to table movement that they swore by. Source local, source small, support farms and local fishermen was a daily practice that this restaurant lived by. I had my daughter about a year and a half later and when I came back from maternity leave I took a position at their sister restaurant as an event planner. I had no experience but it was fun. About a year in I bought one of the first bags of oysters from a local oyster farm that was just starting out and quickly became friends with their sale rep. He kept hinting that they were looking for more sales reps and a year later wore me down enough that I decided to make the very unexpected jump into shellfish sales for them. I spent the next few weeks down in the ACE Basin learning everything there was to learn about oysters, the farm, and seafood. I found a love and passion for it that I never knew I had. I went from a new sales rep to the director of sales in about 9 months after growing their sales very quickly. My motto was the more I sold the more I made so why not sell it all! I developed amazing friendships with chefs and restaurateurs who shared my passion for this local seafood industry. I learned as I went and discovered that sustainability was something I was passionate about. We grew the business to include boutique regionally sourced fish as well as the shellfish and as we grew our inventory I expanded our sales territory to more states in the region. It was invigorating and I adored it.
With this passion I also found that I had failed to set boundaries between my career and home life. I was sacrificing time with my family to work and travel. As successful as I was in my career I was failing at home. I made the very hard decision to resign and I took a few months to be home, be present and reevaluate. When I went back to work it was for a much larger seafood company that thrived on commodity items that were imported and went against most of what I had believed to be right in this industry. Less sourcing local and more importing for profit. I developed a stronger program to source locally, expanded their oyster program to bring in regional and coastal variety sourcing from small oyster farms. I also developed a partnership with our local aquarium that invited me to be an advisor for their Good Catch program which had chefs pledge to source sustainably and regionally for the majority of their seafood needs. It allowed me to give input and push for research for the southeast region in partnership with Monterey Bay Aquarium to increase knowledge and awareness of shellfish and fin fish that are found regionally but underutilized. It got me back to what I was passionate about.
The issue I always had in the back of my mind was the lack of focus in my career on what I loved the most, sustainability and sourcing locally. So, I made the choice to jump ship again and take a risk. I found Heron Farms, an indoor vertical urban farm in the heart of Charleston that used seawater to grow healthy produce. They were doing something that nobody had ever done before and I saw in that so much promise and the impact that it would have on my children in the future. They were tapping into the world’s most abundant resource, seawater, and creating a new form of agriculture, this was AMAZING! They were in their early stages and had so much promise and growth to come and I knew that I could add to that in some capacity. It would be the biggest risk I would take in my career, jumping head first into a startup farm that was doing things so differently. So, naturally, I did it and I loved it right away. In the first few months I took their sales from a handful of restaurants and local distributors to 40 states and a distribution chain up the east coast and across the US. Together we learned to be scrappy with a startup budget (how do you get a Benz with a kia budget? LOL).
The worlds agriculture depends on the use of fresh water. The worlds surface is 98% saltwater and 2% fresh water, only 1% of that fresh water is actually accessible! That’s crazy. Our farm taps into the worlds most abundant resource, seawater, not using a single drop of freshwater and as a bonus, by using seawater, we are putting a dent in sea level rise. From these salt tolerant plants that we grow we are able to capture fresh water that they put out. We can make our own fresh water that is cleaner than what you drink from the tap everyday! With that we can grow freshwater plants and produce. How many farms can say that they make their own freshwater?
We give back by seeding and renourishing salt marshes to hopefully bring back barren unused marshland. This is my passion, to work where I can be a part of making a difference for today and for the future.
I want the world to know all of this about Heron Farms. That our story is a simple one, we have created a new form of agriculture that does things differently. We use a resource that will never run out, that is underutilized, and we give back to this earth while doing it. So many take from this earth but do not give back, we do and I am absolutely humbled to be a small part of that.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I love this question!!! Let’s do this! Places we would visit:
1. Heron farms obviously and then we would take a walk down the road to visit Charleston Fab Lab where they create unique products and furniture with fun 3D tech/printing and are even using hemp for insulation and R&D. Folly Beach needs a day to itself for exploring and basking in the sun. Shem Creek for an evening stroll on the boardwalk to see the remaining shrimp and fishing boats that are still providing the local community with fresh catch, all while the sun sets before we grub. Angel Oak Tree on Johns Island, it’s old, it’s huge, and it’s breathtaking. The Goatery is another fun stop when you are on Johns Island. Go play with the goats, chase some chickens, see all of the baby animals that they are welcoming and take home some farm fresh eggs.
2. Road trip to the ACE Basin! We are heading down Bennett’s Point Road to visit Lowco Oyster Co. Let’s hop on their boat and ride out to the heart of their oyster farm where nature is untouched by man. Where the mouth of the Atlantic meets the three rivers is where you will find the best oysters in the southeast. It is like no other place.
3. Let’s walk. We are gonna park in the old Charleston Battery and walk all day. We will see the old homes and historic sites that Charleston has to offer, follow some carriage tours and listen to their guide spout facts about al that we see. The history of this town is incredible so let’s soak it all in!
4. Eat & Drink: YES! This is where I thrive, lol. We are lunching at SNOB where the farm to table movement in Charleston began. Let the bartender recommend a cocktail or wine to pair with what you choose from the menu, you won’t regret it! On the lunch train for the week will be BBQ (we are gonna hop from one to the other so you can judge who is the best), Fast and French, Edmund’s Oast, Pink Cactus (margs and tacos!), Xiao Bao, and Cudaco (on the way to the beach). Dinner: Hanks, Vern’s (shoutout to Chef/Owner Dan and his lovely wife), Bowen’s Island (best sunset in all of Charleston), Tavern and Table, Wild Olive, and Minero. Let’s get some drinks at the Estuary, Vintage, Gin Joint, Recovery Room and The Griffon.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My shoutouts go to my kiddos, family, and friends that have become family. My father has been a huge part of mentoring me through my career. We are like minded in our sales tactics. We both value face to face interaction, I have learned to plan for all what ifs and every possibility for what may come, and he has taught me that the worst someone can tell you is no so there is no reason not to go for it!
My Dad, Mom, and stepmom have shown me support, love and encouragement through some risky and very hard decisions never wavering, not once. I am proud that this is the model my kiddos are growing up with.  My daughter was tiny at the time but she lead the cheerleading squad for sure.  If a bright eyed little girl who sees you as the coolest mom in the world doesn’t drive and motivate you to do amazing things I don’t know what does!

Might sound cheesy but every day I look at my kids and see in their eyes nothing but hope as far as their futures go. I want to model a strong independent career driven woman that takes risks and has the support of everyone around her. I want the to see the value in working hard and loving hard.

Website: www.heronfarms.com

Instagram: @heronfarms

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindsay-brooks-58312410a/ AND Heron Farms page https://www.linkedin.com/company/heron-farms

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/heronfarmsagriculture

Other: lindsay@heronfarms.com drop me an email for any questions or just to say hey 🙂

Image Credits
Carrie-Anne Warner Heron Farms