A List of Community-Supported Agriculture (AKA Farm Shares) In and Around Chicago for 2025

WTTW / by Meredith Francis / May 8, 2025

During the summer in Chicago, there are plenty of options for buying fresh produce, meat, eggs, and more from local farmers at farmers markets. Community-supported agriculture, or CSA, offers another way to get balanced foods straight from the source, with the added benefit of helping local farmers. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, CSAs (also sometimes called “farm shares”) are made up of “a community of individuals who pledge support to a farm operation so that the farmland becomes, either legally or spiritually, the community’s farm.” In other words, the local farm is the business, and you, the consumer, are the shareholder.

Here’s how it typically works: the consumer pays the farmer a sum of money, and each week or month, that consumer gets a share of the farmer’s product. The share of those goods come in a box or bag, either delivered to your door or picked up at a designated spot. Read More Here.