Urban Organics
The New Farmers Market
By Laurie Perry Vaughen

At the Durham Farmers’ Market the harvest is spread out on the table like fine silver at auction. Here the treasure is silver queen corn—a bargain at $5 for a dozen ears. Baskets of butter beans join Cherokee Purple and German Johnson tomatoes. Shoppers peruse over purple hull beans, Chester blueberries, and burgundy okra.

The names on the baskets sound exotic to those who shop at warehouse grocery stores. However, many of these heirloom vegetables are natives to the area, grown by family farmers who also serve as seed savers to preserve the hardiness and taste of their produce.
Elizabeth Gibbs is manager of the Durham Farmers’ Market—a “Saturday Market”—located in the Historic Durham Athletic Park where the movie Bull Durham was filmed. She notes that the famous Carrboro Farmers market located in nearby Chapel Hill, whose tag line is “Locally Grown, Nationally Known,” has served as a model for Durham’s venture. “Our market is smaller and quite a bit younger,” says Gibbs. “I am encouraged because we are growing and becoming a fixture, a destination, and a community event. We are part of the revitalization of downtown Durham, which was built on tobacco and is undergoing great change. We are within walking distance of neighborhoods and our customer base is very diverse in ethnicity, age, economics, and education.”

Across the Southeast, farmers’ markets bring out the savvy shoppers. According to the Community Alliance with Family Farmers, the average “fresh” offerings in one of the better grocery stores is anywhere from 7 to 14 days and the produce may have traveled as many as 1,500 environmentally expensive miles, losing nutrition and taste along the way. Conventional market systems usually trickle down to the grower only 25 cents of every dollar paid by a shopper for commodity produce.

The Crescent City Farmers’ Market in New Orleans is as diverse as the city itself. Going to market is a favorite event for Chef Susan Spicer, an owner and consultant at several culinary retreats in New Orleans including Bayona, a restaurant in a 200-year-old Creole Cottage in the French Quarter. Like many New Orleans chefs, Susan has always attempted to establish a connection with local farmers. However, the pickings were once slim. “Most of what the farmers were growing were commodity items like bell peppers, radishes, cucumbers, and greens,” said Susan, “and they rarely produced enough to go around after serving the larger restaurants. Eventually the farmers at market began diversifying their offerings to include a wide range of exciting items—items that we never even thought could grow down here, including artichokes, leeks, golden beets and bright lights chard. We are seeing farmers getting excited about their heirloom varieties and getting great feedback on crops grown without pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Figs, tomatoes, field peas and zucchini now come in a wide range of deliciously different forms, colors, and flavor. We also have seafood, artisan bakers and hormone-free milk.” New Orleans’ famous Mauthe Dairy’s Creole Cream Cheese is a local favorite. “When the Crescent City Farmers Market came along, it was a huge step forward in organizing the farmers and giving them a regular venue to meet all kinds of consumers, both home cooks and professionals.”

“People really want to look into someone’s baby browns and hear them say that a vegetable is organically grown,” says Marcie Rosenzwig. This fourth generation grower from California consults with farmers across the country on successful marketing. In her latest book, The New Farmers Market: Farm Fresh Ideas to Make Market Sales Sizzle!, co-written with Eric Gibson and Vance Corum, she notes that consumers are ready for an alternative to the commodity market. “The commodified market puts farmers in the role of being a price taker rather than a price maker,” says Rosenzwig. She notes the plan of a successful grower that offered 30 varieties of tomatoes where flavor and beauty became the driver of price. “This is a proven strategy—to visually differentiate your produce,” she tells growers gathered at a marketing workshop on “Farm Visions from Family Values” sponsored by Crabtree Farms of Chattanooga in early spring.

The nonprofit Crabtree Farms is an urban farm, community garden site, and educational center espousing best organic practices that is operated on land owned by the City of Chattanooga. Crabtree holds a mid-week locally grown farmers market and also offers “subscribers” the ability to use an Internet website grocery list to check off local produce, eggs, meats and cheeses each week. Subscribers learn, via e-mail reminders, “what’s ripe for market” weekly. It has been very successful and they plan to expand the number of subscribers next year. Area white cloth restaurants, such as the elegant St. John’s downtown, now include mention of Crabtree Farms and other local growers on their menu.

Community supported agriculture is a powerful tool used by organic farms as a risk-sharing tool in an industry where weather or pests can weaken profit margins. This movement has been in effect for decades in certain areas, but is becoming mainstream with consumer demand for healthy, organic produce. CSAs vary in policy, but generally members, or “shareholders” as they are sometimes called, pay a seasonal or monthly fee to receive regular supplies of fresh-picked produce. Most CSAs have regular “pick-up” sites such as a major employer, school, high-rise, or neighborhood center. Many small natural food stores and restaurants also participate in CSAs to keep their produce isle or menu fresh and tempting.

The demand for strong farmers markets is growing and getting the attention of city leaders, such as those in New Orleans, Durham and Chapel Hill, who understand the impact of a vibrant market in revitalizing urban areas. “The ‘rural-urban’ connection is the heart and soul of a farmers’ market,” says Rosenzweig.

In Chattanooga’s historic Southside district a unique open-air market opened in April 2002. Set inside the turn-of-the-century bones of the former Ross Meehan foundry, a relic of the city’s heavy industrial past, is Chattanooga Market. Chattanooga Market at Cricket Pavilion, as the former foundry is now referred to, invites farmers and artisans from within a 40-mile radius of the city, to ensure that shoppers can “buy local.” Vendors at “Sundays on the Southside” offer freshly picked produce, fresh cut flowers, jewelry, baked goods, pottery, and other handcrafted items. A Market Café offers entertainment and ethnically diverse local cuisine. The crowds continue to grow and the market now has a large following of regulars, both as vendors and shoppers, who enjoy the offerings and the closer connection and reflection on the seasons.

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