It’s not every day you hear about a business plan that looks to build a hydroponic farm as phase II after creating a design and marketing firm.

But that’s the game plan for Seth Stephens, Mason Green and Louis Montes, three friends from Indiana who discovered Durango in 2015 when Stephens moved to the area to work in information technology at Purgatory Resort.

“We all came out here as a group,” Stephens said. “Nine friends piled in a car for a couple of hours together and came out here to visit.”

Coming out of college with a degree in computer network administration and business administration, Stephens was offered a job at Purgatory, and he figured he could work and at the same time learn to snowboard.

“I had never seen the Rocky Mountains before,” Stephens said. “And the first time that I drove through the mountains, it was a no-brainer. Like as soon as I got here, I didn’t want to leave.”

Key for both the current Chinampas Design firm and the coming Chinampas hydroponic farm is a large 3D printer and laser engraver that allows Chinampas to create unique items as corporate memorabilia and marketing material – and in the future will be used to create the irrigation and greenhouse equipment needed for the hydroponic farm.

Three-dimensional wood puzzles of elk heads (called a vegan head mount by the Hoosier trio), dragonflies and penguins are all available for purchase on Chinampas’ website – all early products of the design and marketing firm that started in mid-October in the back half of a building shared with Think Network on Main Avenue.

Green said, “Our goal is to do things that constantly catch your eye.”

Besides the marketing of physical products like the 3D puzzles, Chinampas Design also does web design, branding and software development.

A chinampas is the Nahuatl word used by Mesoamerican tribes to describe their hydroponic gardens created on rectangular, artificial islands floating in lakes in Mexico’s central valley.

The trio’s design firm uses photogrammetry, building a 3D model from thousands of pictures of an object from different angles to create the puzzles using their 3D printer.

Eventually, those manufacturing capabilities will be turned to making joints, sprinkler heads and other material to build the hydroponic system and greenhouse.

Green said the initial idea was to begin the business with the hydroponic farm and only later move to open the design and marketing firm. But COVID-19 forced a reversal of plans with the hydroponic farm delayed, so the trio moved ahead with the design firm, swapping phases of the business plan.

“It’s not exactly what we were shooting for. But I don’t see this as a drawback,” Green said. “We were going use this machinery either way. And this gives us more time to focus on branding and e-commerce. It’s caused us to kind of flip on our side and do a lot more web development, e-commerce, and it got us to get our digital presence up way faster than we anticipated.”

The trio reversed the order in which they opened their business because the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted markets for a firm in Ohio from which they were seeking financing for the hydroponic farm.

They are planning to begin a small-scale trial of hydroponics in the office with culinary mushrooms and some greens in a few months.

The group was on the verge of buying 40 acres for its hydroponic farm near Hesperus when the novel coronavirus upset plans.

Now, the group is again searching for a home for the farm.

Stephens admits planning a farm in the West has been eye-opening for someone who grew up in small-town Indiana, where you couldn’t see over the cornstalks stretching from the family farmhouse in all directions.

“I had never heard of water rights until I moved out here,” he said. “I mean, you dig down far enough anywhere in Indiana and you hit water. You don’t need water rights in Indiana. Usually, you need to get rid of water.”

When up and running, the hydroponic farm will likely start by growing greens for salads and evolve into growing produce like tomatoes and tubers in its second year, Stephens said.

Chinampas plans first to supply restaurants in the Durango area, but eventually, it anticipates having enough product to supply restaurants across the West from Denver to Albuquerque and all the way to Las Vegas.

Down the road, Chinampas is looking to partner with Farmacy, a company in Muncie, Indiana, to grow produce to help ease medical conditions including gastrointestinal disorders, hypertension and diabetes.

Essentially, the plan would be for a doctor to prescribe a salad for you to help deal with your condition.

The first hydroponic system Chinampas would set up would supply restaurants, but later systems would grow greens and produce as a satellite of Farmacy, which uses what it calls Environmentally Controlled Sustainable Integrated Agriculture with medical providers in Indiana.

The trio could have developed the hydroponic farm in Indiana, and probably been in operation years ago, but Stephens said since moving to Southwest Colorado, the group is committed to establishing the business in the region.

“I feel like I’m in the right place. The Durango community is unlike anywhere I’ve ever been,” he said. “It makes me want to outreach. It makes me want to be involved. This place, it’s rare that I run into somebody who isn’t incredibly supportive. There’s lot of really good people around here.”

parmijo@durangoherald.com