Career & Business

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, our blog series featuring personal stories from Verge grads speaking on how permaculture shaped their careers and their lives. This time we’re [...]

This month, we had the chance to chat with John Hemmerle, owner of Our Land Organics, a Cincinnati-based ecological landscape company and a 2017 graduate of the Regenerative Business Mentorship [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, our ongoing blog series that features personal stories from students speaking on how permaculture shaped their careers and their lives. [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, our blog series that features personal stories from students speaking on how permaculture shaped their careers and their lives. This [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, our blog series that features personal stories from students speaking on how permaculture shaped their careers and their lives. This [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, our blog series featuring personal stories from past students speaking about how permaculture changed the direction of their outlooks [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, a new blog series featuring personal stories from past students speaking about how permaculture changed the direction of their outlooks [...]

Welcome to the final episode in the podcast series, 6 Base Principles for Starting, Running, and Improving a Successful Business. You can listen to Part 1,  Part 2, and Part 3 to get up to speed, [...]

Some of you may remember a conversation Javan and I had a few months back about the 6 principles for starting, running, and improving a successful business. The podcast below continues that [...]

Rob here. I’m back with Javan speaking with Diego Footer over at Creative Destruction, this time on the marketing of small farms from a city dweller’s perspective. An intro: [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, a new blog series featuring personal stories from past students speaking about how permaculture changed the direction of their outlooks [...]

Welcome to “How Permaculture Changed My Life”, a new blog series featuring personal stories from past students speaking about how permaculture changed the direction of their outlooks [...]

Welcome to the 3 part of this blogging series on Permaculture consulting (Check out Part 1 & 2 Here). In this latest post, I’m going to offer the advice I wished I had when I was starting [...]

Last post, I spent some time dispelling the 3 main myths around permaculture consulting. (You can read it here). This time, we’ll delve into 4 reasons why a business in the regenerative field [...]

Rob here. I’ve been consulting in the permaculture world for close to a decade now. Before that, I consulted in the oil and gas industry for another five, so suffice it to say I’ve been around [...]

Javan and I recently chatted with Diego Footer from Creative Destruction on his Voices of Change podcast series, featuring “honest, hard conversations about farming, business, and life with [...]

Here is Part 2 of my chat with Diego Footer from Creative Destruction and his Voices of Change podcast series, featuring “honest, hard conversations about farming, business, and life with [...]

Lorinda Peel is a herbalist-in-training and a former Verge grad. We’re happy to feature her guest blog, first published over at Reforged Ironworks, a company that crafts hand-forged tools [...]

Over the years, Javan Bernakevitch and I have taught a lot of Permaculture Design Courses (~60 combined) and have encouraged many of our students to start businesses that fix the planet, the food [...]

I had a chance to chat once again with Diego Footer from Creative Destruction, formally known as Permaculture Voices, on his podcast series featuring “honest, hard conversations about [...]

Tim Wickstrom is a Verge grad who has started his own forge business to make permaculture and garden hand tools (Check out his Alumni Profile here). Here is the final piece of his three-part [...]

Recently I had a chance to chat with Diego Footer from Creative Destruction, formally known as Permaculture Voices, on a podcast series featuring “honest, hard conversations about farming, [...]

Tim Wickstrom is a Verge grad who has started his own forge business to make permaculture and garden hand tools (Check out his Alumni Profile here). Here is the second piece of his three-part [...]

Tim Wickstrom is a Verge grad who has started his own forge business to make permaculture and garden hand tools (Check out his Alumni Profile here). Here is the first piece of his three-part [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Josh Hellawell Founder, Synergy Permaculture Inc. and Synergy Urban Farms Graduated from Verge PDC in 2014 Expertise: Urban Farming, Composting Josh’s Story Agriculture is in [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Brent Smith & Nadine Brooks  Founders, Paper Street Permaculture Graduated from Verge in 2014 Brent & Nadine’s Expertise: Ecological analysis, drylands permaculture, [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Shannon Dyck Co-founder, Radiance Cohousing Environmental Coordinator, City of Saskatoon Designer, Prairie Habitat Garden Restoration Project, University of Saskatchewan [...]

Verge Grad Profile Adrian Buckley, Co-Founder, reGenerate Design, Ltd. Adrian’s Expertise: Design consulting, construction, and teaching services. Specializing in food forest design, schoolyard [...]

Members of The Agrihood Project, Verge grads Anaya Lea, Andrea Rocchio, and Rob McWilliam are part of a group of Calgarians seeking a more connected and rewarding rural life. Their dream: To [...]

Verge Grad Profile Rene Michalak, 2009 PDC Grad Principal, Phoenix Fire Consulting Project Lead, ReThink Red Deer Education Chair, American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association Expertise: [...]

Verge Grad Profile Sven Stave, Farmer, Field to Fork Premium Pastured Poultry Graduated from Calgary PDC in 2014 Expertise: Holistic livestock management, pastured poultry production Sven’s Story [...]

Verge Grad Profile Rebecca (b) Smith, Canadian delegate for Terra Madre Giovani (We Feed the Planet) Graduated Spring 2015 B’s Story Coming from a university background in ethnobotany (the [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Ted Bahr, Founder, Prairie Sage Permaculture Graduated from Calgary PDC in 2011 Ted’s Expertise:  Permaculture drafting and design, tour management and facilitation, wild [...]

Verge Grad Profile Carmen Lamoureux, Founder, URBANFARM Permaculture Project. (Now Urban Farm School) Graduated from PDC in Calgary 2013. Carmen’s Expertise: Soils, Silviculture, Forestry, [...]

Verge Grad Profile:  Jeremy Zoller, Owner, Sunshine Earth Works Graduated from 2013 PDC in Calgary Jeremy’s Expertise: Permaculture Design, Landscape Construction, Earth Repair Jeremy’s Story:  [...]

Verge Grad: Tim Wickstrom, Calgary PDC graduate, 2013. Tim’s Expertise: Founder of Edible Earthscapes. Specializes in permaculture design, vermicompost, food production, water harvesting, and [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Jodi McKee & Eric Fontenot, Nelson 2012 Verge PDC Jodi & Eric’s Expertise: Co-Owners of Urban Homesteading Store, based in Stoney Plain, AB Jodi & Eric’s Story:  [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Karla Cox Graduated from the Verge PDC in 2011 (Nelson, BC) Lives in Cochrane, AB Karla’s Expertise: Water management Educational workshops Composting Vermiculture Vertical [...]

Verge Grad Profile: Mike Dorion Graduated from the Verge PDC in 2011 (Nelson, BC) Mike’s Expertise: Compost Teas/Extracts, Soil Building/Soil Biology, Composting/Vermicomposting [...]

Growing Good Business Video Series Part 3: So Many Opportunities, Where Do You Start? In 2007 we first watched – and were completely awestruck by – Geoff Lawton’s “Greening the [...]

Growing Good Business Video Series Part 2: Hindsight is 20/20 – What The Permaculture Experts Learned the Hard Way In 2007 we first watched – and were completely awestruck by – [...]

We travelled to the Permaculture Voices conference in Temecula, CA this past March to interview successful permaculture designers, teachers, farmers and business owners and get their top tips! [...]

  Are you hesitating at the doorway to a permaculture career?  We’ve got the experts’ tips to get you started… Presenting… The Growing Good Business Video Series! [...]

 Check out the past articles in the Permaculture Business series:  Part 1: Tips from the Pros Part 2: On Opportunities Part 3: Barriers and Challenges “What would you have done [...]

(Find Part 1, Tips from the Pros here and Part 2, Opportunities and Niches here)  A Personal Take on Barriers to Success As with any career or business, there are barriers to achieving success. [...]

(Find Part 1, Tips from the Pros here)  Opportunity is about seeing things differently What is amazing about permaculture are the number of solutions that are contained within the design system. [...]

I’ve been running Verge Permaculture for five years now, and before that worked as an engineer in the oil and gas industry. Starting a business was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I didn’t [...]