By: Stella Ponser
(Jan 26, 2012)
This market was always high-end hoity-toity stuff, but not like now!
Comment on this Review
Save yourself some big bucks and stop at the food court at the Trumbull Mall. Yeesh, You'd think a farmers' market would have farmers. OK, this one does, two or three of the very best that CT has to offer. But plow yourself past the bakeries and takeout foods and and - - -Where's the Farmer?
Small farmers? forgettit! $500 to apply. Agree to a table fee. And a percentage of take. Look at the numbers, and you have to be a mighty-big-entity to survive that camp...Even the percentage-daily fees are skewed, big time, against the small players.
This is NOT what Paul Newman wanted.
Makes me sad.
Comment
Hi Stella, This post was just sent to me and I thought it would be worth addressing your comments. We do have all organic vegetable farmers and lovely baked goods and prepared foods. We are also the only market in CT that requires all of our prepared foods to have one locally farmed ingredient thus supporting our farmers further. We have ten farmers which is more than any market our size has and we can confidently note that they are -as you said - the best around. I am not sure where you received your information about our fees but our fee structure is quite low. The other markets in the area charge $500. We only charge $175 for a stall fee per season with less than 5% of a weekly fee on their earnings. This makes us the market that helps the vendors take home the most money possible and they are grateful for the hard work we do to keep these fees low. This coupled with our efforts on education and promotion of conversation around local food have allowed us to become our own 501c-3, which is no small task. We work hard to support our mission and continue to hope that other markets will follow in our foot steps with stricter guidelines that support the local farmer. I would love to walk you through our market, share our guidelines and hopefuly, show you that this market is holding true to the essence of farmers' markets by supporting our local small and mid-sized farmers. Let me buy you a local blueberry iced tea and share this wonderful place with you. Our dream is that one day, places like the Trumbull Mall will have nourishing local food that supports the local economy to offer their shoppers. Until then we invite you to support WFM. Kindly, Lori Cochran-Dougall Market Director director@westportfarmersmarket.com