Clearwater Farms

Some farms have history and some farms have credentials, but very few have both in the way Clearwater Farms does. Located at 142 W Elmwood Road in Caro, Michigan, in the heart of Michigan’s Thumb region, Clearwater Farms is a seventh-generation family operation run by brothers Kevin and Jon Findlay, whose family has been farming this specific stretch of land for well over a century. The farm transitioned to certified organic production in 1998 under their father and has never looked back. Today, Clearwater Farms (the parent company of Harvest Ridge Processing and Findlay’s Organics) spans more than 2,500 acres of certified organic cropland growing yellow corn, wheat, dry beans, field peas, spelt, and other grains and legumes. All products are USDA Organic Certified, Non-GMO Project Verified, and certified kosher through Kosher Michigan. For food manufacturers, kosher food buyers, and ingredient sourcing teams looking for a certified kosher organic farm in Michigan with a traceable, family-controlled supply chain and genuine agricultural depth, Clearwater Farms is one of the most credentialed operations in the state.

 

 

Michigan’s Thumb is one of the most productive agricultural regions in the Great Lakes area, and the microclimate created by Lake Huron makes it particularly well-suited to organic dry bean and grain production. The Findlay family has been farming this specific land long enough to understand its rhythms, its soil, and its seasonal patterns in ways that newer operations simply cannot replicate. That depth of place-based knowledge is reflected in the consistency and quality of what Clearwater Farms grows year after year. For certified kosher food manufacturers sourcing organic dry beans and grains as primary ingredients, the combination of USDA organic certification, Non-GMO Project Verification, and Kosher Michigan certification on commodity crops grown in one of North America’s best organic farming regions is a sourcing foundation that provides both quality assurance and certification continuity.

The farm operates as part of a fully integrated family business that includes Harvest Ridge Processing, the on-site processing facility that custom cleans and packages commodities, and Finn Flyer Transport, the family’s hauling company that moves bulk commodities throughout Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio. That end-to-end family ownership means the kosher certification through Kosher Michigan covers the agricultural product as it moves from field through processing and into packaged form, all within a single controlled operation. For a certified kosher food buyer, that level of supply chain transparency is genuinely rare at the commodity grain level and reflects the kind of traceable sourcing that ingredient verification increasingly demands.

Clearwater Farms also hosts the CWF Organic Expo, an annual event that brings together organic growers, buyers, equipment dealers, seed dealers, and agricultural service providers from across the region. Kevin Findlay has described the expo as a community-building effort, designed to connect organic producers with the buyers and resources they need to maintain and grow their operations. That investment in the broader organic farming community reflects a business philosophy that goes beyond production and positions Clearwater Farms as a genuine institutional presence in Michigan’s organic agriculture landscape, not just a supplier.

Clearwater Farms is located at 142 W Elmwood Road in Caro, Michigan. For certified kosher food manufacturers, organic ingredient buyers, and wholesale grain and legume sourcing teams looking for a seventh-generation, USDA certified organic, Kosher Michigan certified farm in Michigan with full supply chain transparency and over a century of agricultural history behind it, Clearwater Farms is one of the most complete and trustworthy sources in the state.