Two Types Of Indoors Systems: Our Indoors Rack System And Vertical Aquaponics System
The first type of indoor system we offer, the Friendly Verticalis vertical aquaponics system, puts more plants into your greenhouse OR indoors growing area at a lower cost to build and to operate than ANY other vertical growing technologies that we know of.
(Below) Baby green onions in a Verticalis, which costs about $1 per plant space to build yourself. 
The second type of indoor system we offer is the Friendly Indoors Rack System. You could use it in a greenhouse, instead of a building, and the natural light there would reduce the amount of artificial light you needed to supply. It can’t be used WITHOUT artificial lighting in a greenhouse, because the upper racks shade out the lower ones and the plants don’t grow. But it’s the most economical indoors system we know of, with only a slightly lower planting density than our Verticalis.
(Below) Multiple units of our Friendly Indoors Raft System under construction:
And in operation:
Costs per plant space:
- Our Verticalis cost around $1 per plant space when using natural sunlight only for lighting (not including greenhouse or aquaponic system costs).
- Both our Verticali and our Indoors Rack Systems, when installed indoors and lit with High-Output T5 flourescent lights, use 3 watts per plant, and cost less than $3.00 per plant space, including the cost of the lights (not including building or aquaponic system costs). In a large installation, you’ll get four to eight times as many plants into the same building footprint as our competitors with the Rack System, and ten to twelve times as many with the Verticali.
- When lit with high-efficiency LED’s, they’ll use one-fourth the electricity and put out only one-fifth of the waste heat that “cheap” LED’s on the market do. This type of LED will add about $2 per plant to the per-plant cost previously quoted; but they’ll save you more than that in the first six months on your electric bill.>
- The other proprietary vertical growing technologies available cost from $18 to $45 per plant space (not including building or aquaponic system costs), and you have to buy everything from the manufacturer.
If you only want to build a single Verticalis, click here to see an inexpensive set of plans for that.
If you want to build a larger farm using the Rack System or multiple Verticali in a single greenhouse or building, you’re on the right page. Our Farm Plans here are for aspiring indoors and vertical commercial-scale aquaponics growers, and includes plans for both our Indoors Rack System and MULTIPLE unit Verticalis installations for larger farms. Sorry, we DON’T offer a “single” Rack System set of plans, because the smallest feasible Rack System runs about 3,800 square feet of raft area; not cheap!
Purchase our Indoors And Vertical Aquaponics Farm Plans, which includes our Friendly Indoor Rack System Plus the MULTIPLE unit Verticalis plans and manual $195.00:
Using only natural light for growing with our verticais aquaponics technology (plural: “Verticali”), you get 6.25 plants per square foot of greenhouse space. If you’re growing indoors with artificial lighting, you can put the Verticali MUCH closer together, because there’s no concern over one Verticalis blocking the sunlight from the next one. Then you get 12-1/2 plants per square foot of building space. That means a smaller, less expensive greenhouse or building that costs less to build, and less to heat and cool, forever!
And cost to build? Even including the cost of the 24-foot by 100-foot greenhouse (we’ll tell you about that in a bit), the projected cost per “Sunlit Verticali” is less than $5 per plant space, and cost per “Artificially Lit Verticali” is less than $7 per plant space! These numbers, that you can verify by putting your local costs into our “Verticalis Crop Worksheet”, include the cost of the greenhouse too! These spreadsheets come with the Indoors And Vertical Farm Plans package.
And we have production numbers:
The Worksheet is a custom ExCel spreadsheet that allows you to financially compare a 24-foot by 100-foot installation of naturally-lit Verticali to one with artificially-lit Verticali to determine which is the best choice for you. This spreadsheet only comes with the Indoors And Vertical Farm Plans package. If you know how to use spreadsheets, or have a friend who does, it’s EASY to edit the spreadsheet to reflect the numbers for any size farm.
These cost and power consumption numbers are easy to check against anyone else’s vertical growing technology; just ask them how many watts a certain “farm” installation of theirs uses, then divide by the number of plants in the farm. Ask how much their “farm” installation costs, then divide by the number of plants in the farm. We’ve seen electrical consumption numbers from our competitors from 10.9 up to 12.6 watts per plant; and costs up to $35 per plant, NOT including any greenhouse costs. This is not what you’d call economical or profitable!
In contrast to the Verticalis and our Rack Systems, two well-known vertical aquaponics growing solutions claim a high plant density per square foot; in fact they look great on paper. That is, until you realize that they’re only counting the density of plants in the “footprint” of their towers. They’re NOT counting the 3 feet or so that each tower needs to be separated from the tower next door in both directions, so that enough sunlight can reach them, and so you can reach them to plant and harvest in and out of them. When you include that space, these systems end up with only 2.7 plants per square foot of greenhouse floor space.
Our simple, economical and low-tech raft systems give you 4 plants times the total square footage of greenhouse floor space, and without all the expense and trouble of vertical towers. So when we went to invent something better, we knew it had to hold a LOT more plants than our raft systems do. This is how we came up with the Amicus Verticalis, which means “Friendly Vertical” in Latin.
For more information on how we developed our vertical aquaponics technology; the “Verticalis”, read our “Special Newsletters” #’s 15 through 19, by clicking here.
(Below) The first generation of the Verticalis. This Verticalis has some “teenage” green onions in the bottom and middle “layers”.
But there’s another, much more important reason why our vertical aquaponics technology is such a big deal: the fact that it holds so many more plants means you only need a greenhouse 1/2 the size to hold the same number of plants as these patented vertical systems. And if you’re planning on growing indoors, you only need a building 1/4 the size!
And this is where you really save money; because not only does purchasing and erecting a much smaller greenhouse or building cost that much less, but the ongoing costs for heating and cooling the greenhouse or building are only 1/2 to 1/4 as much. This means you can fit a large commercial operation in a small footprint; and that saves you money forever!
This is our largest vertical and indoors farm DIY aquaponics package:
Purchase our Indoors And Vertical Aquaponics Farm Plans, which includes our Friendly Indoor Rack System Plans Plus the MULTIPLE unit Verticalis plans and manual $195.00:
This Do-It-Yourself course covers all aspects of building and operating an installation consisting of our Indoors Rack System OR multiple units of our vertical aquaponics system indoors using artificial lighting. The Verticalis can also be operated outdoors in a greenhouse, using natural sunlight, at a lower density and cost than you get when using artificial lighting indoors.
It is intended for people who want to make money with vertical aquaponics, and who have basic construction skills using wood and PVC pipe. It includes complete plans for our Indoors Rack System, plus plans for the Multiple and Single-unit Verticalis, as well as plans for a sample 24-foot by 100-foot multiple Verticalis layout in either a greenhouse or building, with materials lists for the plumbing parts, air blower, and water pump required.
This package is for people who:
- Already know everything they need to know about commercial aquaponics, (because this package does not include information on either aquaponics or how to make a profit with it!) OR
- Have previously purchased our Commercial Aquaponics DIY package or Commercial Greenhouse package. If you have, you’ve already got all the aquaponic information you need to make a Verticalis installation work.
- AND want to do this at a large scale. Based on our spreadsheet and experience in the industry, we think a 5,000-square foot building, filled with Verticali or our Indoors Rack Systems, is the MINIMUM necessary to have a profitable operation. You’re probably looling at a minimum $400,000 investment. Please don’t get upset with us if you purchase this package, run the numbers, then realize you’re not going to pay for the farm with 4 Verticali or 400 square feet of Indoors Rack System (although we do know one exceptional individual who was making 1,200 square feet of Indoors Rack System turn a profit).
- You don’t need to have an existing aquaponic system to make this work, but you ARE going to need to build one to hook our INdoors Rack System or MULTIPLE Verticali up to; they aren’t stand-alone units. Details and materials list for a sample 10,000-square-foot Indoors Rack System, plus sample plans for a Vertical aquaponic system in a 24-foot by 100-square foot greenhouse/building are included with the plans.
- If you haven’t already purchased the Commercial Aquaponics DIY package and/or Commercial Greenhouse package, and you want the additional knowledge, simply add “Commercial Aquaponics DIY package” or “Commercial Greenhouse package” in “Options” when you check out.
This Indoors And Vertical Aquaponics Farm Plans package includes complete information on how to build our Indoors Rack Systems, how to hook several Verticali together, on lighting for both of them, and also how to set up your greenhouse with fish tanks and open space so that a Rack System or a multiple Verticalis installation actually works. It also includes complete plans and income projection spreadsheet for the sample plans of the 10,000-square-foot Indoors Rack System that are included, plus a floor plan and layout for the vertical aquaponics systems, plus a plumbing, equipment, and materials list for a multiple Verticals installation in a sample 24-foot by 100-foot greenhouse, as well as our new “Verticalis Crop Worksheet”. This last is a custom ExCel spreadsheet that allows you to financially compare that 24 by 100 installation of naturally-lit Verticali to one with artificially-lit Verticali to determine which is the best choice for you.
The Indoors And Vertical Aquaponics Farm package does not include any custom design services. If you want to use a greenhouse and/or an existing aquaponics system that’s a different size, you can take a shot at it, or have us design it for you. To help you with this, we offer custom design services as an option, starting at $995 per greenhouse on your site plan (if you’re just planning one or two greenhouses of the “V”).
If you’re planning a large project, please contact us for a custom proposal, because reeely large vertical aquaponics installations need
Indoors And Vertical Aquaponics Farm Plans package includes: downloads of our Indoors Farm Manual, which includes both the Rack System instructions and the Verticalis instructions, Verticalis CAD plans for both the single Verticalis installation and multiple Verticalis installation, CAD plans for the Rack System, and equipment and materials lists for both single and multiple Verticali.