The farmer who stopped paying 30% to a middleman

Tom has been farming a 12-acre smallholding in the Southwest for eight years. Mixed vegetables, seasonal boxes, and a small amount of livestock. He sells at two local farmers markets, through a box scheme, and — until recently — through two online marketplace platforms.

The online platforms were a necessary evil. They gave him reach — buyers he would never have found through the markets alone. But the economics were brutal. One platform charged 15% on every transaction. The other charged a monthly listing fee plus 10% on sales, plus payment processing fees on top of that. By the time Tom had paid all the platform fees and processed all the payments, his margin on online sales was substantially lower than his margin at the market — where he paid a pitch fee and kept everything else.

"I knew I was paying for reach," Tom said. "But reach to men and women I'd never meet, who had no reason to trust me and no relationship with my farm. I was essentially renting access to strangers."

The other problem was discovery. On the large platforms, Tom's listings competed with imports, with larger operations, and with sellers who had the budget to pay for sponsored placement. The algorithm decided who saw his produce. He had no control over his own visibility.

Tom's listings on ETC accept Unity Pounds, LETS credits, and bank transfer. When a buyer pays in Unity Pounds, the transaction carries 0% platform fee. No commission, no processing fee, no listing fee. The full value of the transaction moves from buyer to seller.

The Unity Pounds Tom earns don't sit idle — he spends them back into the community on tools, repairs, and services. A neighbour who is a plumber, also a member of the community, accepts UP for callout work. The community's mechanic takes UP for services. "The money doesn't leave," Tom said. "I earn UP from selling vegetables and spend it on things I'd have to pay sterling for otherwise. It stretches everything."

Buyers who don't yet have Unity Pounds can pay by bank transfer — no surcharge, no fee. Tom also accepts a mix: 50% UP and 50% bank transfer is common, and the platform handles the split automatically.

For the first year, Tom ran a simple comparison. He kept records of what he would have paid in platform fees on each transaction if it had gone through his old channels. After twelve months: the ETC transactions had saved him the equivalent of four weeks of produce sales. He had effectively given himself a four-week paid holiday by switching platforms.