This Internet site is the front door to a business partnership between the two of us, Chuck and Carla Offenburger, now living at “Simple Serenity Farm” on three acres near Cooper, Iowa – which is nine miles south of the Greene County seat of Jefferson, or about 55 miles west and north of Des Moines.

The business includes this news and opinion site, which will continue to be free to all interested.

It includes an online retail operation, “Our Iowa Store,” which we launched in February, 2003, to feature the work and/or services of Iowa authors, artists, crafters and manufacturers that we Offenburgers have, use and endorse.

This site made its debut in March, 2001, as www.chuckoffenburger.com

With its total redesign and expansion in January, 2003, it became www.Offenburger.com

That reflected the increased involvement of Carla Offenburger as a columnist, book reviewer and manager of our online retail store.

We could not operate without good “webmasters.” Our son Andrew Offenburger served as our webmaster from 2001 until the spring of 2003, when he was succeeded by Andy Upah, then a Buena Vista University student and, after graduating in 2004, now working full-time in information technology in West Des Moines. Andrew Offenburger is now in graduate school at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.

Our featured columnists are Chuck Offenburger writing “Out in Greene County, Iowa”; Carla Offenburger writing “My View from the Porch” in addition to her book reviews in “What’s Carla Reading?” In addition, we’re featuring the pictorial splendor of Iowa as snapped by photographer Don Poggensee, who is based in Ida Grove, Iowa. And we are particularly proud of the Guest Columns we publish regularly from friends and readers scattered worldwide.

We feature an opinion poll called “THE CONTINUOUS IOWA CAUCUS,” which asks questions about matters great and small, serious and not-so. We tell you about events you should try, if you really want to sample the character of our state, in “COMING UP IN IOWA.” We have a letters-to-the-editor section we call “Say what?” And we give you news vignettes you’re probably not finding anywhere else in “Our Iowa News Digest.” We also give you a new photographic view every week of how things are at our place in a feature we call “Here’s looking at life at Simple Serenity Farm.”

The whole Offenburger.com enterprise is based on our small farm, which is possible because of the excellent high-speed Internet service we buy from Jefferson Telephone Co., which is the local agent of it for Iowa Network Services, based in West Des Moines.

This expansion of the website has meant a considerable financial investment for us.

As we grew it, we asked for and received financial support from this site’s “Partners and Patrons,” and we hope you readers will join us in thanking them. We’re also looking for some additional underwriters who can help us keep this site available free to readers.

We decided in late 2002 to swallow hard and ramp it up, for four reasons:

First, we think it’s going to become a viable business, one that will be somewhat of a model for how Internet-based companies can operate from rural Iowa for customers all over the world.

Second, we think we’re taking this step at a time when Internet usage, especially in the Midwest, is getting ready to mushroom to levels we haven’t even imagined. Why? Reliable, high-speed Internet service is finally available to homes and businesses in small towns and on farms, just as it has been available in more urban areas for several years.

Third, we think this is a business we can grow and operate for the rest of our careers.

Fourth, we think it’s going to be good for Iowa. And fun.

- Chuck and Carla Offenburger

Offenburger.com, 1516 310th Street, Jefferson, Iowa 50129 USA
(515) 386-5488
chuck@Offenburger.com carla@Offenburger.com