As I dive into the research at when and why markets were founded, I have been using my part-time FMC role to respond to a dozen or more reporters this month. Both require me to come up with a narrative around farmers markets that needs updating regularly as more market types emerge, and as external pressures affect what and how they can offer all of the good things.
The reporters have mostly been believers in local food systems and farmers markets, which by the way, historically has not always been the case. This group had ideas for stories about how well markets are doing during the many food outbreaks, but also wanted to gently discuss some tougher questions too. Those included the widening use of the term farmers market when the social contract of farmer-focused is ignored (that we assure them that the markets that work with FMC do follow) and instead prioritize crafts or commodity food to be sold under the farmers market name, and if we can explain why total SNAP retailers that are farmers markets are “declining,” (I immediately tell them I don’t think that is what the data means), or ask questions that suggest they think markets operate in a policy vacuum or that markets always call the shots for their plans and goals.
But those two activities of mine send me thinking about how success just creates different problems, and that the stability and diversity of markets in 2026 may in itself create some confusion.
And makes me wonder if markets can hold the core values that generations of markets have collected and practiced under our umbrellas and tents even while they get pushed and pulled from all sides.
Those first markets in the 1970s had a mostly blank slate although they did not have an easy time. To their everlasting credit, they chose some strong guidelines (have to grow it to sell it, use no or fewer chemicals, get an agreement to use temporary outdoor spaces), and were able to communicate those values to their local community, most of whom (once they understood what was being offered) were hungry for the opportunity to meet farmers and to support local production. Even so, those few hundred markets had many problems to overcome, and usually did it handling a little mocking or a lot of obstruction from those partners one would hope would have helped. Reading long ago articles and listening to stories from their founders shows how complicated it really was, so much more so than the few written histories of markets that are available suggest.
And it has become even more complicated. More market types have ben developed, more communities want markets for beautiful reasons but when the time comes for developing the rules and guidelines, those newer leaders can be impatient with the methods and goals of the 1970s, or 1990s, or even the 2000s. The ancient term of farmers market isn’t a trademark opportunity, nor should it be. Still how do markets define who, what, and why? How do they show that farmers markets hold local production and decision making as the primary values?
And how to connect like-minded markets that agree to the core goals, encourage those who are willing to reset their market to meet those goals, find connections in affiliated sectors to strengthen those core goals, and communicate all of it to the world?
One idea is to build an agreement matrix to illustrate where all markets are within the larger spectrum of ideas such as local, seasonal, transparent, farmer-focused, inclusive, iterative, innovative, and as system change agents. The matrix would show that there is no one sized right answer; just a series of checks that indicate where a market is within the larger sector, where they are on the continuum of market types.
That might look like:
1. An agreement that they understand and follow a state or territorial definition of a market organization. This is not necessarily the one that the legislative or funding community use currently. Instead this is one that describes how a well-functioning market operates and how it can be measured including staff on site, written rules, enforcement, clarity about budgets and staff including transparency about who makes decisions about market day. Lots of leeway as to this set of guidelines would be needed, but it would help new markets understand just what they are planning, and help established markets set benchmarks.
2. Creating market level program definitions. This might include why do markets raise funds for programs, what the difference is between a pilot and a program, and who those programs benefit. It’s time for markets to own this part of their work more completely rather than having funders set the terms.
3. System change concepts. This is often misunderstood. What I mean by this is that the the system change market’s goal isn’t ONLY to set up a weekly set of stalls; it’s to change behavior, anchor localism, and/or build a circular economy system that doesn’t devolve into mass capitalism. Because if the goal is ONLY to let people sell local items, sitting outside in a hot, wintry or rainy parking lot 4 or 8 hours a week isn’t the only way that can happen, and a market is a very management-heavy way to do it. Instead, the modern farmers market history suggests that most of the 8600 market sites are in in service to larger goals and ongoing advocacy of those who are fighting for the right to produce food with fewer stages between the harvest and the eater.
Some of these concepts are those already in practice, but we should also remember that new ones may begin as new generations take over. Here are a handful of those concepts that I see regularly:
local wealth, rural to urban connections, championing fewer pesticides and additives in food, serving as places of belonging, leading as the fulcrums of well-functioning food systems, prioritizing regional farming, embracing the roel of civic spaces for all residents, building food access partnerships…
4. Markets need to show up and share and not just when they want to, but when others need it too. They need to build affiliations with nearby markets (for which they may even have a bit of a trader zone competition), with networks of markets across geographical boundaries that share the same characteristics, with other direct to consumer channels (CSAs and farm stands), with market managers of flea, public or art markets; with event planners, with food justice leaders, with planning, recreational, transportation entities. To do that, we have to ensure that the role of the market manager becomes respected, well-funded, and sustainable.
5. This is maybe the toughest: to agree to learn, to evolve, to change, to listen and to challenge biases and assumptions leaders carry to make something that lives past the founder or the current manager, serving the surrounding area as it changes too.
If markets could do that, they might reduce some of the pressures. It would also make the exciting and lofty work more understandable to those who wonder why markets set up in parking lots, and why they don’t have bananas. It would make it harder for pretenders to co-opt our name and language. And it might just make the work into a true movement.
That’s what I’ve been thinking about; tell me what you think too.
* This is a post that explains the title:
Helping Farmers Markets Grow 