People go to farmers markets for many reasons. The jovial, wholesome atmosphere makes people feel good about their communities, and offers an opportunity to catch up with friends, and appreciate the hard work put in by area farmers. And sometimes, we even want to buy a little food. But this is becoming an increasingly rare act, according to a recent Washington Post article.
Zach Lester, a Virginia grower who sells at D.C.’s trendy Dupont Circle market told the Post his sales were down 25% in recent years, even as the market has become more popular than ever. The culprit, I assumed, would be the influx of young, hungry farmers stealing market share from the aging lions who built the movement. Indeed, census data from 2012 suggests the number of farmers selling directly to consumers—presumably at farmers markets—is on the rise, despite a decline in the overall farmer population. So I was skeptical about where Lester thought the root of the problem lay.
He didn’t blame the competition for his woes. He blamed the hipsters for sucking the oxygen out of the market. By hipsters, we mean people who come to the market but don’t buy produce. Sipping on their lattes, deep in conversation, they care more about the scene than the cilantro. They might purchase a breakfast taco, but no basil. Maybe a pint of strawberries, but no rhubarb. And in their unhurried schmoozing they clog the aisles like arterial plaque, impeding the flow of serious shoppers looking for actual produce. And that’s if they can even get to the market in the first place, because parking stinks. The serious produce shoppers, according to the Post, would sooner just go to the store.
My hometown of Missoula, Mont., provides a laboratory for testing the idea that hipsters can hurt vegetable sales at the market. For years, the Missoula farmers market was agonizingly strict about which items could be sold. Only raw plant materials were allowed. No pickles. No hot food. No meat. Not even a hide from a farmer’s own sheep. Nonetheless it was a nice market, everyone loved it and it got so big that another one appeared nearby, also on Saturday, to get in on the action.
From the get-go the new market was a showcase for anything goes, including prepared food, face painting, balloons, hot chocolate, baked goods, fresh, frozen and smoked meats, and of course coffee drinks. The feeling was strong that this was what the old market “wanted” to become, if only the folks in charge would have let it. The new market was everything that we, the shoppers, wanted: a diverse, festive atmosphere rooted in, but not shackled to, farm-fresh produce.
The once-booming original market was suddenly a backwater, and you could almost hear the cheers and laughter drifting over. The free market had spoken.
Fast forward a few years, and the original market, amazingly, is still around. I still go for certain items from vendors I’ve long patronized. And I’m not alone. That market, which many of us had left for dead 10 years ago, now offered a surprisingly valuable commodity: a peaceful, pleasant shopping experience. The new market is bigger, with more vendors, and a lot more choices of produce and other stuff. But it’s more crowded. And, especially with kids in tow, more work.
“It’s more of a social event than a shopping event,” agreed Stephen Paferi, a grower at the new market who’d jumped ship from the other one. And like many who had done the same, he was questioning his choice. Another farmer, Mike Duda, observed, “They are here for the scene, for the coffee and breakfast sandwich or whatever.”
There is no doubt in Duda’s mind that the people there for the scene are suffocating the market. “People with strollers—four people having a conversation, which is fine, but it’s frustrating. And if you’re a customer that wants to go to the farmers market and get some food, you’re like, ‘Nah.’”
Josh Slotnick sells produce at both markets. He told me that he does twice the business at the original market than he does at the new market. If farmers can earn more at the relatively dead original market than at the bustling new market, something is amiss. Surely the fierce competition plays a role, but the case against the hipsters is compelling as well.
