Brian -

The first step we took when starting a market 3 years ago was to put an article in our local and surrounding newpapers advertising a "meeting of interest" to determine if you have other like minded individuals interested in starting up a market. Make sure you have a date, time and meeting place set up and put that in the newspaper article. Then, wait and see who shows up. We had about 15 people at our first meeting. Then had meetings after that and about the same 8-10 people stuck around to put the market together and that became our board of directors. Go the the link (cut and paste) I have provided below and it will give you some basic guidelines.

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/FY639

I also highly recommend you get the book "The New Farmers' Market - Farm Fresh Ideas for Producers,Managers and Communities. Its a great book with lots of information. Also, there is unlimited information and ideas online. This will be our 3rd market year and it gets better and better. It is so much fun. I am the market manager, and trust, me - I had no experience with this at all when we started, but there is lots of information available to help you.
Feel free to email me if you have any questions. Good luck!

hengal...thank you very much. I will look at the information and get back with you on questions.

Sorry the delay...I was away for a few days...

Brian

Brian, often churches have strong senses of social and community responsibility. Not only might you be able to negotiate the free use of parking lot but the church may help with the certification for the WIC and Senior Farmers' Market Nutrition Programs. In fact, I can guarantee that if you get a good handle on how those 2 programs work and show up with a little presentation for the church board - they will listen to you. These are win-win-win programs for farmers, markets, and the beneficiaries.

The link to the Florida State extension's advice on farmers' markets that Hengal gave you looks like a good one. You can also find USDA information here.

To find a state organization for your part of the world go here. Just search for your state and you'll get a list of markets but more important for your purposes, the contact info for your state association. These folks should have an info packet and cheap membership/insurance for a newly formed market.

When I was involved in market formation, the group of interested vendors simply agreed on daily vendor fees and then paid for half the season. That money covered the cost of state membership and insurance. After a successful start, we anted up the remaining vendor fees and paid for some advertising.

As Hengal suggests, a good place to start is with your local newspaper and that contact may get you some initial publicity. Another group which is charged with assisting growers in marketing is Cooperative Extension. You may have a marketing specialist for small farms nearby. A conversation with that person could yield a wealth of contacts. The office may even be willing to help you with mailing out an invitation and arranging a meeting of growers at their offices.

The entire process of starting a market can be a lot of fun! Remember that the farmers are your most important resources. They can be a cranky lot (that's why most of 'em aren't allowed to live in town. ;o) But, with a small committed group - you've got a farmers' market!

Steve

WOW!!!!!!! I never in my wildest dream thought there was so much organization / politics and "potential expense" that went into a Market! I always assumed Farmer Joe talked to Farmer Steve and organized a couple more venders to join them at the Baptist church parking lot at such & such time Sat...and that was that! I have a much deeper appreciation now for all of you that jump through hoops to provide good produce to the general public. My hat is off to you.

I was involved about 10-yrs ago getting our Knothole baseball organization registered as a 501(C)- 3 organization. I do not know why I thought a Market would be any different...duh!

Well I certainly appreciate all the information you two have given me...thank you. It will take me awhile to digest everything.

One last question..."Is it worth it?" What I mean...would the benefit of organizing one 5-miles from my house "out-weigh" driving 30-minutes to an established one? Does the "problems" make it worth it? Do personalities colide making it more of a hassle for the manager than enjoyable?

My hometown is your typical midwestern "country small town." Kind of like Mayberry with out Andy & Barney...and not as clean. We have 5-churches with a population of less than 1,500 in village limits. There is probably 10,000 people within 5-miles from center of town. Farming was probably the #1 employer 50-yrs ago...but now most of the farmers are gone and everyone drives between here and the city 40-minutes away to work.

There is only one IGA store in town and another IGA 15-minutes away. The closest Super Walmart & Krogers is 25-minutes away. I think it would work very well here. All the churches have huge parking lots and 2 of them are right on the main drag of town.

Any thoughts???

Thanks again...Brian

I deffinently think it is worth the time and effort to get a market started. The beginning set up is the hassle but after that it isn't so bad and things are all on track. Usually most all the vendors get on fairly well and know each other if they are from a localized area. There will be a few problems but that is always to be expected so you just handle them. I do four markets a year. Only one did we have any problems. That one happened to be a private group that made their own markets away from the county run market group because they wanted to control who sold what and when. I feel that is not fair to the vendors. Beyond that we always have had great luck with our markets. I am now taking over the helm of my most local market and getting our packets ready to hand out this weekend at our winter markets to drum up interest for new vendors. My area on the Vermont/NY boarder is very into the market scene and there are many markets in the area but there always seems to be enough people around to visit all of them and make it a go. You just have to let the people know your there. BIG SIGNS HELP! Also being in a very visable spot for drive-by traffic to see you and spir of the moment stop to see what's there. Just hang in there and once you get the start-up work done you will see that the market will work and other will help out if you ask.

Starting a new market should involve some thought because if you start it with the wrong set of rules it will be hard to change. I'd insist on a producer only market as the primary criteria of participation.

Location is fairly important. I wouldn't hesitate to drive 30 mi. if there was a good customer base to rely on. Consider joining the distant established market,getting established in your marketing skills and then attemt to organize a second market in your area. People set up markets in larger urban areas because that's where the people are. From the town discription that you gave you may be trying to sell produce to farmers and that usually fails.

If people are driving 40 miles to work in a city then that location would be my primary focus. Talk to the city governing body to determine what they might do to help. They might just be willing to close a central street or provide for some advertising using leverage you can't afford. You'll never know unless you ask.

I would strongly suggest that you drive the 30+ minutes to an established market if you want to make money growing for market. Unless you have a great town to start a market in (either a population of over 100K or a college town) expect very slow sales for the first 3 to 5 years unless you get a board together and hire a market manager who can do some good marketing.

Do not try to do this yourself AND also be growing for market. Both are full time endeavours and i think in your case you will want to concentrate on learning how to grow and sell produce commercially (which is a lot different than having a huge home garden and it takes several years to get decent at at).

At an established market you can learn the ropes of being a market farmer as well as seeing how a good market should be run (assuming you have some well run producer only markets within an hour of your farm).

Start the market in your area only if you will be okay losing money on your market garden for several years because that is the most common scenerio.

Thanks everyone for the advice! I believe I am going to take it and sit out this year. I am going to try and get on the vender list for the closest Market to me. Kind of get my feet wet and learn the ropes. At the same time put out some feelers in my area to see what kind of reception I get.

I really appreciate all the information / website links from you guys...it has been a God-send!

I hope everyone makes enough this year from their gardens that you pay off the mortagage and retire!

God Bless...Brian

these are great ideas. I have to agree with boulderbelt on this one.

I've been suckered into going to new farmers martets (as a vendor) and its not fun. While the stats. say that farmers markets are popping up everwhere. I would strongly advise people who think they want to start a new farmers market need to do a business plan of some sort. AND get input from potential customers not only farmers.

Farmers markets are events. it needs to be exciting and busy, if its not, people will not come again. and I am waisting my time at a dead market.

In addition I'd like to say that there is a symbiotic relationship between farmers and customers. If farmers don't show up consistanly, niether will customers. And if customers don't come to market, other farmers will stay home.

I feel like I'm the gloomy one here. But I've got to tell you how I feel. I give you credit for wanting to do something for the community. I attended a lecture last year called "finding food in the farmland" very interesting about the difficulty of finding fresh local food in farm country where the main crop is corn soybeans.

Sorry again for being the gloomy one in the group. Go to the market 30 min. away. In a few years start your market you'll be ahead of the game.
Kristi