The chicken and the egg are now available for rent in northern Colorado and Cheyenne, Wyo.

Over-easy, sunny-side-up and melted into breakfast omelettes… there’s a new and popular way to get farm-fresh eggs delivered and enjoyed daily through Rent The Chicken, without a long-term commitment or going to a feed store. Rent The Chicken is a recently-launched, progressive franchise offering the whole kit and caboodle for rent. The real deal includes a portable coop, at least two egg-laying hens, feed for the rental season and phone and web chat support. Delivery is free within 50 miles of Greeley, Fort Collins, Boulder and the northern suburbs of Denver.   

“It’s all covered, it’s turnkey and by the next day you have fresh eggs,” said Phil Tompkins who co-founded Rent The Chicken with his wife Jenn. 

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Newly-available since the beginning of this year through the local franchise of Blooming Health Farms located in the heart of Greeley, Colo., customers receive everything they need to start, as well as a how-to-care sheet and a book called “Fresh Eggs Daily.”

EGGS-CITED AND EGGS-PERIENCE

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“Call as soon as you read this article, because we’re already running out of inventory,” said Sean Short, executive director and co-founder of Blooming Health Farms. After being recruited by the Tompkins, Short is excited (eggs-cited) about offering a Rent The Chicken franchise in northern Colorado and southeast Wyoming.

Chickens are rented for the season; from May-November for $485 with a $50 deposit to get on the delivery schedule. At the end of the season, you can adopt the chickens, or chicken out. There used to be a similar farm in northern Colorado, and now Short is building on that experience (‘eggs-perience).

Rent The Chicken has grown, with franchises all over the U.S. and Canada through the farmers they work with (called affiliates like Sean Short) in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, as well as Colorado.

Three years of product and supply chain issues related to the pandemic, and the rising price of eggs have increased their business.

“We’re helping families create a revenue stream by helping rent out chickens. By having chickens, people are taking something out of the supply chain that’s no longer an issue for them,” Tompkins said.

Launching Rent The Chicken in northern Colorado is an inspirational story revolving around a need in the community and Short’s own hard life lessons. 

AT-RISK YOUTH INVOLVEMENT

He employs at-risk youth who’ve had trouble with the law and truancy, to help give them a better path in life. One student who was acting out, was still coming in and doing his chores, and Short could tell the teen had immense possibility to re-direct his life path. 

“I just saw all this really raw good stuff, and I took him to the winter farmers market in Greeley, and at one point, I walked away to talk to vendors. When I returned, that student had already sold all the eggs,” Short said. Then, the teen started explaining they needed more chickens. “He said, if we had more, we could do this and that, and I’m listening to this kid come up with a business plan. I went online that night to find adult-laying hens, and immediately bought 100 chickens.”

And so began Short’s franchise. 

“We’re a non-profit farm that’s using fish – and I’ve had a lot of success working with youth, and teaching them to farm fish,” Short said. He’s been looking at FFA and 4-H programs and how to do agricultural entrepreneurship with youth. 

As a former at-risk youth himself, Short’s own heartening story propelled him to change and make a better life for himself and others.

TURNING HIS LIFE AROUND

“For me, I was an alcoholic, and did a lot of delinquency things and ended up on the wrong side of the law. I struggled with addiction, made poor choices after being intoxicated and didn’t take responsibility for those poor choices. It snowballed. A lot of my motivation for going to school, was — I couldn’t get a real job,” Short said. With plenty of time to think during those jail stints, he observed that others were lost people who lacked skill sets and had traded everything for a life of crime.

“As I was in these places, I learned the best way to discover who you are is to help others. It started as a survival technique, to pass the time. I love writing and people began asking me to help them write, and even translate to English,” Short said. 

Another pivotal moment, is when Short got a call from a licensed therapist telling him about an agricultural prison program in Cañon City, Colo., called Farm and Fish.

“When I heard that people who get released from prison don’t end up back in, and that they’re finding their path, that was it,” Short said. One month later, Blooming Health Farms was born as a farm where troubled youth get talk therapy while they learn to raise fish. The northern Colorado farm became a nonprofit 501c3 aquaponics farm, using fish water to farm.

Therapists at Blooming Health Farms are paid through the state. Masters degree-level counselors also assist through co-founder Ryan Smith’s private practice. The two founders, Smith and Short feel strongly that mental health support is scientifically proven to reduce youth involvement in crime and gang activity.

Short also enjoys working with the Hatch The Chicken program which is used mostly at preschools and daycare centers where teachers and students monitor the 21 days it takes to hatch, then return the chickens. Short, who has a bachelor of science degree in molecular biology and is working on his master’s degree in systems engineering through Johns Hopkins University online, has also developed an organic cherry tomato and is preparing tomato starter plants for customers who have already signed up. He also self-published a book, “Thinking Outside the Soil.”

Short grows his own chicken feed which has produced quality, nutritious eggs. Through everything he grows and breeds, his focus is born out of a welcoming heart…to change and make a difference in others’ lives.

To contact Sean Short, go to chickens@bloominghealthfarms.com or call (844) 310-8782.

For more information, go to info@RentTheChicken.com, http://www.RentTheChicken.com, http://www.facebook.com/RentTheChicken, http://www.instagram.com/RentTheChicken and on Twitter @Rentthechicken.