Comments on: Midtown Farmers Market: Week 13—Great Produce

By: Linda

Linda — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 20:38:26 +0000

The photo of the carrots is one of my favorites of yours. It is a bouquet of carrots.

By: Tom

Tom — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 04:04:24 +0000

Amy- You make a good point about what happens when you go to the market with limited funds; going to Midtown is a pretty big weekly event for me (as regular readers probably gathered) so I’m usually prepared with money to spend on produce and ICFs. But if I didn’t have the money or I didn’t bring it with me, this could be an issue. Personally, I’d probably go for the produce.

Brian- Thanks for your comment; you are right to bring the question back to the ratio of produce vendors to ICF vendors. At Midtown, though, I think they are getting this right: the ICF vendors don’t crowd out the growers. This is just my impression — I haven’t talked to any farmers. Some day I’d like to explore more deeply the economics of farmers markets, especially from the growers’ perspectives. Then again, if the primary benefit of participating in the market is not day-of sales but, for example, marketing, having prominent ICF vendors that pull people to the market is a more straightforward benefit.

By: Brian Ames

Brian Ames — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 22:03:04 +0000

I wanted to add that while many of these food vendors like Chef Shack totally support local I do feel its important to note how small of a window growers have to unload their produce at top price.

Produce loses value every day its picked and also as each season for that produce progresses to saturation prices also move downward.

Food Vendors are an important part of the experience but my original comment on Heavy Table targeted the RATIO of food vendors to growers and also suggested markets should give FIRST priority to those producers or growers who have ICF to sell at markets.

We already have a plethora or festivals, fairs and events for vending ICF’s. Farmers Markets should serve the interests of growers and producers first in my view.

Glad to see there is some open discussion on this topic.

By: Amy P.

Amy P. — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 14:59:42 +0000

Great post, Tom, it gives you something to think about. I’m a bit on the fence about this myself. I think that the food vendors can draw you to a market and do make it a fuller experience. Plus I like to support those local small businesses. But they may also draw dollars away from the produce vendors. Case in point – I stopped at the new St. Anthony Village farmer’s market on Monday night partly to get something to eat for dinner plus pick up produce. I only brought about $20 with me, and by the time I was done buying gazpacho and a salad from Chef Shack, then a hot dog for my husband at Magic Bus Cafe, then a jar of pickles for my daughter I’d spent all my money and didn’t have any left for fresh food. How ironic. Next time I’m going to think more strategically about how I spend my dollars.

By: Cupcake Happy Hour at Sweets and Morning Roundup | The Heavy Table - Minneapolis-St. Paul and Upper Midwest Food Magazine and Blog

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 09:56:10 +0000

[...] to score a free cupcake (or five!) at Sweets Bakeshop (our profile’s here), Martha and Tom speculate about the role of vendors of immediately consumable food at Farmers Markets, a possibly world [...]