Farmers Markets serve as the front line for local food in our communities. These markets are often the first association most community members have with local growers, and they can serve as a powerful community building tool. Often, these markets are run by producers who, admittedly, don’t have time to develop programs or marketing during the market season, so we believe in creating community-based Boards or committees to help share the load with vendors throughout the year.
Healthy Harvest of NI lends technical support to assist markets in generating new structure and programing. We pilot Farmers Market programing, such as Healthy Harvest Bucks Program Healthy Harvest Bucks Project and a Farmers Market Workshop, to support local efforts.
We also have a regional Farmers Market Project Team as a part of our North Iowa Local Food Coalition who meet monthly to learn from each other, share resources, and develop joint projects that positively impact all partner markets. In 2017, we piloted Kids Farmers Market Cooking Classes and developed a Farmers Market Kids Cooking Class Toolkit that can be used by other markets attempting to host their own cooking classes. 2018 promised increased collaborations on kids activity resources and cooking demonstration support.
For more information on Farmers Market support, contact Marie.
Farmers Market Kids’ Activity Guide
Market managers, local food advocates, partners, farmers, and volunteers, THANK YOU for your work within our local food system in North Iowa. We have put together a sampling of activities here with the hope of making our markets even more family friendly and accessible. You will find a variety of activities here; from encouraging kids to try new foods, getting their bodies moving, and family-friendly recipes. Many have accompanying worksheets (located at the end) that you may print or copy for take-home activities. Links to most of these are indicated in the activity, where applicable. You know your market’s demographics best, and many can be adapted for younger or older audiences. Download the printable PDF here.
Our partners over at the Iowa Valley RC&D and the Northeast Iowa RC&D published an Iowa Farmers Market Toolkit which is available online on their website. This toolkit is comprised of three distinct pieces:
Vendor Handouts
The Vendor Handouts are a series of 1-page handouts intended to make being a manager a little easier. By providing a summary of information focused around a topic geared towards farmers market vendors.
Market Manager Handbook
The Iowa Farmers Market Manager Handbook combines broad best practices with ideas and encouragement from real Iowa farmers market managers. This place-based approach offers potential market managers and existing market managers in Iowa an opportunity to connect with colleagues from similarly sized towns, provide their boards or committees with justification and inspiration, and fuel grant applications and private sponsorships.
Lettuce Grow Training Series
The Lettuce Grow Training Series is a series of videos recorded from past trainings that took place from 2017-2019 around the State of Iowa. Now the series is available online. Each training features an experienced market manager and vendor providing insight on farmers markets.