Meet Amberly Farm and their new self-serve Micro-Market

Posted on 23 August, 2024

Beginning as a humble self-serve fridge for eggs, this farm-gate Micro-Market in Kambah is doing big things.

Since John and Carol Lilleyman purchased Amberly Farm in 2012, the family have been passionate about regenerative agriculture; finding a way to live and farm in harmony with nature, whilst giving back to the community and the planet.

Led by their youngest son Adam in 2017, the Lilleymans introduced pastured chickens to improve soil health by eliminating the use of synthetic fertilizers.

Since then, Amberly Farm has built a loyal following for their much-loved pastured free-range eggs. And now, the Lilleyman siblings – Elise, Adam and Guy have come together to offer the community an alternative way to shop and support local – the Amberly Micro-Market.

The trio was inspired by the concept of a small-scale farmers market and created the farm shop to offer other local farmers and producers an opportunity to sell their products directly to people who love Amberly eggs.

From fresh fruit and veggies to handcrafted pasta from the Braidwood Food Company, everything in the Micro-Market has been specifically sourced to be as local as possible – with coffee beans from Redbrick Coffee, bread from Wildflour, and muesli from GH Nutrition recently hitting the shelves. And it’s all completely self-serve.

“We’re stocking anything that fits our ethos, which is sustainable, ethical, and has low-food miles.” explains Guy.

“It’s supposed to be an all-day farmers market… for me, it’s a total novelty to go into a shop and buy things that are made in my suburb.”

And with 4,500 happy chickens roaming Amberly Farm, farm fresh eggs can be bought daily along with living microgreens grown by Guy and preserves handmade by Carol.

“We saw the value of what we have here and wanted to do something good for Canberra. People really care about where their food comes from – we saw that with the eggs – and we wanted to expand on that.”

“My family had no experience in farming before now; my parents are the first generation on the land. My siblings and I are taking over from our parents now,” says Guy.

Originally buying the farm as a retirement project, for John and Carol, building Amberly Farm into what it is today has been a labour of love. As the Lilleyman siblings take more responsibility on the farm and step into bigger roles in the farming community, they want to continue their parents’ legacy – including leaving the land better than when they found it.

With farmers encountering rising production costs along with the ever looming threat of extreme weather conditions caused by global warming – not to mention the recent avian bird flu that swept through parts of New South Wales, briefly reaching Canberra in July – Guy says that the Amberly Micro-Market is a small way the local community can support the family as the farm faces these challenges and continues to evolve and diversify to continue to serve the community.

“Supporting the ventures that farmers are already doing is crucial. There’s no guarantees in farming and we never know what’s coming next … we just want to farm and grow food for people.”

“We want to make it work out here and keep our family out here for further generations.”

With plenty of plans for the future of Amberly Farm, the Micro-Market is just a taste of what’s to come – because they know, from little things, big things can grow.

Images supplied.