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Jersey Dispatch: Collingswood Farmers' Market
I want to thank you very much for what I consider a very thoughtful and observant article. However, as Director of this market, I must point out some things you might not be aware of concerning your EBS diagnosis.
Yes, we do have a whole lot of bakery! We have Springdale Farms, who operates a bakery to boost the viability of maintaining their working FARM and uses their own produce in items such as zucchini bread, tomato cheese pie, and more. Another bread bakery bakes local harvests, such as strawberries, into featured seasonal items. The two other independent family bakeries we feature call Collingswood home. It gives me great pleasure to offer them a venue that increases their market presence (no pun intended) when they can easily be lost to a region full of mass-producing, supermarket bakeries.
By complaining about the excessive bakeries we host, you may have just positively advertised that we have a lot of good stuff! Thanks.
To call non-farmers an ailment is a matter of opinion. I don't hear such a sentiment coming from regular shoppers, who are the foundation of our market's economy, or the farmers at the Market.
Thank you for highlighting four of our many growers, excellent picks. I love them too! I must point out we host at least a dozen additional agricultural participants (produce farms, orchards, beekeepers, flower farms, a dairy/meat farm, and nurseries) during a season. Please come again.
Betsy Cook, Director
Collingswood Farmers' Market.
Jersey Dispatch: Collingswood Farmers' Market
I know this is an older post, but I was looking for some info on the Collingswood Farmers' Market and ran across this. As someone who frequents the market weekly when it's open (and mourns its absence when it's not), I have no problem with the bakeries represented at the market. It's very convenient to be able to buy my produce, meat and bread for the week all in one place and take home a few treats for my boys. No complaints here.
Jersey Dispatch: Collingswood Farmers' Market
Betsy:
When farmer's markets began to reappear in the Garden State, a big deal was made about how they were just that; farmer's markets.
Today, the success of farmer's markets is well-known. They often draw huge crowds of serious shoppers. The question I've been asking in both my talks and this post is "should farmer's markets be for something other than what's grown on farms?"
By far and away, the largest group of non-farm vendors at New Jersey markets are bakers. Would a crowd like the one I saw at Collingswood attend a "baker's market" without farmers?
Why not just name the markets honestly?
Couldn't your market be called the "Collingswood Food Market" instead?
I believe that the distinction is a serious and important one. We in New Jersey have no shortage of shops that offer baked goods of very high quality. However, I often find myself driving thirty minutes or more to find local, in-season, fruits and vegetables. This is why I want to see farmers at "farmer's markets." More than that, I want to see farmer's markets that are for farmer's, first and foremost.
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I want to thank you very much for what I consider a very thoughtful and observant article. However, as Director of this market, I must point out some things you might not be aware of concerning your EBS diagnosis.
Yes, we do have a whole lot of bakery! We have Springdale Farms, who operates a bakery to boost the viability of maintaining their working FARM and uses their own produce in items such as zucchini bread, tomato cheese pie, and more. Another bread bakery bakes local harvests, such as strawberries, into featured seasonal items. The two other independent family bakeries we feature call Collingswood home. It gives me great pleasure to offer them a venue that increases their market presence (no pun intended) when they can easily be lost to a region full of mass-producing, supermarket bakeries.
By complaining about the excessive bakeries we host, you may have just positively advertised that we have a lot of good stuff! Thanks.
To call non-farmers an ailment is a matter of opinion. I don't hear such a sentiment coming from regular shoppers, who are the foundation of our market's economy, or the farmers at the Market.
Thank you for highlighting four of our many growers, excellent picks. I love them too! I must point out we host at least a dozen additional agricultural participants (produce farms, orchards, beekeepers, flower farms, a dairy/meat farm, and nurseries) during a season. Please come again.
Betsy Cook, Director
Collingswood Farmers' Market.