0
0

2026 AMERICAN ELDERERRY CONFERENCE

Registrations have closed.
2026 AMERICAN ELDERERRY CONFERENCE

2026 AMERICAN ELDERERRY CONFERENCE

by
845 845 people viewed this event.

June 17-19th in Mt. Vernon, M

The American Elderberry Conference is a yearly event that takes place in the heart of the American elderberry farming world, right here in the Midwest! This conference brings together scientists working on the latest American elderberry research in health and lifestyle. It brings in farmers who travel in from across the globe to learn the latest techniques to increase production and build sustainably.  Included also are makers and innovators, who use American elderberries in various products available on the market.  The American Elderberry Conference provides valuable insight into the elderberry industry and helps connect American farmers with businesses.

June 17-19, 2026

2026 American Elderberry Conference

Building a Sustainable Future in Health, Agroforestry & Industry​​

Schedule:

Wednesday and Thursday we will be at The University of Missouri’s Southwest Research Extension and Education Center. Enjoy two days packed with information, lunch, snacks and vendors at the facility and we will tour their elderberry planting on Thursday. Presentations, presenters and schedule will be shared with ticket holders once finalized. Thursday evening, relax and network at the reception (more information coming soon). Friday, we will have a number of local elderberry farms available for you to tour.

The American Elderberry Conference is a yearly event that takes place in the heart of the American elderberry farming world, right here in the Midwest! This conference brings together scientists working on the latest American elderberry research in health and lifestyle. It brings in farmers who travel in from across the globe to learn the latest techniques to increase production and build sustainably.  Included also are makers and innovators, who use American elderberries in various products available on the market.  The American Elderberry Conference provides valuable insight into the elderberry industry and helps connect American farmers with businesses.

Each year the demand for elderberry products grow here in the USA. Elderberry researchers, farmers and product makers are on the forefront of this industry. Working together to unite and continue to build this marketable crop.  The yearly American Elderberry Conference digs deep into farming techniques and helps guide farmers to get the best yield for their acreage. This conference educates product makers building or using a processing facility, as well as creating value added products. It also brings in the latest research in areas such as American elderberry for brain health, diet and more. The conference focuses on the industry as a whole and how to build that: whether it be through product innovations, commercial farming techniques, community, marketing and more…

https://www.riverhillsharvest.com/2026-elderberry-conference

 

Date And Time

06-17-2026 to
06-19-2026
 

Location

Share With Friends

What are we, exactly?

Lionberry 's Weekly Delusion and Re-illusion Update.

BS Weekly #13

That’s the question I keep circling after Mount Vernon. Are we a specialty crop, or are we bait for big ag? Because those are two very different futures, and American elderberry is standing right at the fork.

This June the national elderberry community gathered in Mount Vernon, Missouri. The Heartland American Elderberry Collaborative brought our poster. LIONBERRY REGENERATIVE™ stood alongside Elder Farms and River Hills Harvest. Dr. Andrew Thomas hosted, Buehler Organics and Elder Farms put on a dinner, and researchers, growers, and processors all ended up at the same tables. Good food, good people, real momentum.

But here’s the edge I can’t put down. The moment a crop gets valuable, the commodity machine notices. It comes in offering scale and efficiency, and it leaves behind growers who no longer own anything, working someone else’s market for someone else’s margin. We’ve watched it happen to crop after crop. The question isn’t whether American elderberry is worth that much attention. It’s whether we’ll be the ones holding it when it is.

So why does this crop matter enough to fight over? The science is finally catching up to what growers always sensed. American elderberry is anti-inflammatory in a way that speaks straight to how most of us actually live now, carrying oxidative stress from overprocessed food. And it’s stepping into the GLP-1 and metabolic-recovery moment, where early results on blood sugar and fat oxidation are turning heads. Our native berry isn’t the understudy to European Sambucus nigra either. The American acylated anthocyanin is more protected, more likely to survive processing and reach where it’s meant to work. We are not the lesser version. We are the better one, and we’re only now saying it out loud.

That’s exactly why the fork matters. A crop this promising will get built into a market by somebody. The only question is whose hands stay on it.

Here’s where I land, and where Mount Vernon left me hopeful. We are small, and small is not the weakness everyone assumes. Small means we can actually know each other. It means a grower, a researcher, and a brand can sit at one dinner table and leave understanding each other’s language. That’s how an AgriCluster works. We stick together, we grow the grower base on our own terms, and we build the shared story before anyone builds it for us. We’re standing on fertile ground here, in the dark, underground, where the real trading happens before anything shows on the surface.

More growers, yes. But growers who own it. That’s the whole game.