Direct sale of fruits and vegetables in the supermarket, by growing these products on the roof! This is the concept proposed by the Toulouse start-up Maraîchers du Ciel to supermarkets with its turnkey vegetable gardens, from planting to putting on the shelves a few months later. It has just set up its premises at the Marché d’Intérêt National in Toulouse after having validated its service this summer with a first production in the summer.
“Our project combines agriculture and building, since we cultivate on the roofs, explains Clotilde Latieule, agricultural engineer and president of Maraîchers du Ciel, created in April 2021 with Laurie Battini, civil engineer, and Marine Rivron, architect. Supermarkets can produce on their roof or on nearby land, if they have it. We set up the vegetable garden, cultivate it, maintain it, harvest and put the products on the shelves, clearly identified as grown by the store. It’s ultra-short circuit!
The production is done partly for tomatoes, cucumbers and aubergines, the other part being cultivated in hydroponics, that is to say without soil, in particular for aromatic herbs. In April, the three Toulousaines signed a contract with Intermarché in Ramonville (Haute-Garonne), creating a 200 m2 vegetable garden on the store’s land.
“Since June, we have harvested nearly 350 kg of fruit and vegetables which have then been sold directly in bulk on the shelves of the Intermarché, explains Clotilde Latieule. To explain our approach to customers, we had set up a dozen activities and the feedback was really positive”.
Les Maraîchers du Ciel, which are aiming for harvests from March to mid-November, are already in talks with other supermarkets in the Toulouse conurbation to set up new vegetable gardens.