Q: How do you like to describe what you do?
A: I'm an employee of the city of Maple Grove, a parks and recreation department specialist. But I mostly answer to "market manager." Market organizers wear a lot of hats and have skill sets that are a mile wide and an inch thick. I recruit and support vendors. A huge component is logistics and event planning, and there's a lot of marketing and social media work, and finding partnerships on behalf of the market community. I went to a virtual national farmers market conference this winter. They sent a swag bag ahead of time, and one of the items was a button that said, "Our jobs are weird."
Q: How large is the Maple Grove Farmers Market?
A: From here on in we'll have 45 to 50 vendors, and then we'll start shrinking again in the fall after the first frost. Attendance is also seasonal, it's a bell curve. Right now it's about 1,300 to 1,400 adult shoppers, and that grows to 2,500 in July and August.
Q: Produce-wise, what will shoppers encounter in the coming weeks?
A: We had a dry, cool spring, so the produce might be a week or two behind. There's a nice selection of salad greens, microgreens and salad toppings, things like radishes and green onions. A couple of vendors offer lovely, beautiful mushrooms, and of course there's asparagus and rhubarb. But June changes fast. By mid-June we'll have strawberries, and then all heck breaks loose. We'll have hothouse tomatoes in a few weeks.
Q: What are some misperceptions about farmers markets?
A: That they're only for hipsters, or for people who have a lot of money. That's very much not the case. I'm proud to say that we serve all kinds of people at our market, and I hope everyone feels welcome. Another misperception is that things are expensive. It's much more helpful to think in terms of value rather than cost. I'd much rather buy a head of lettuce that's perfectly green and crisp all the way through than a head of lettuce that was harvested a week ago in California and is partly brown halfway through.
