2020 Women in Business Panelist

Barb Fisher is the owner and operator of Barb’s Butchery, a butcher shop in Beacon, NY that sells nose-to-tail meats from local Hudson Valley farms. Staying local is important to Barb, who’s lived in Beacon for more than a decade. A career as a college math teacher brought Barb to the Hudson Valley and the Hudson Valley’s passion for supporting high quality locally sourced food will keep her here. It may be surprising that someone with dual degrees in mathematics and no real experience in a commercial kitchen would become such a passionate butcher, but Barb loves making products by hand and playing the mad scientist who finds creative ways to squeeze familiar favorites like pot pie and loaded baked potato into sausages. In fact, the butchery currently sells more than 50 varieties of artisanal pork, lamb and chicken sausage.

Barb spends her free time snowboarding, mountain biking, and doing crossfit—all of which help her keep up with the physical demands of her job as a butcher and a mom of two. She really enjoys finding new and creative ways of using the more challenging parts of animals and making it more accessible to people.