Metro Roundup: Farmers market picks up speed during pandemic

Not even a once-in-a-century pandemic can slowdown one of Alabama’s largest farmer’s markets.

The Market at Pepper Place sees more than 10,000 people on a normal Saturday at the height of the season. The outdoor season was expected to reopen in April, but when the novel coronavirus began shutting down businesses across the world, The Market shifted its business model to offer contact-less, drive-through service and opened a few weeks early.

Now, some farmers at The Market are selling more than a typical Saturday during regular market season.

Here’s how it works: customers go to The Market’s website and preorder their items before 6 p.m. Friday. Then, they drive to the pickup lane set up along Second Avenue South on Saturday between the hours of 7 a.m. and noon, and vendors place the items in the back of the customers’ cars.

Not only is this “contact-less” method safe, but it’s also convenient for shoppers. Marble Creek Farmstead, one of The Market’s vendors, said the most customers the business has ever received in one day at the outdoor market was 112. The business often has long lines at the outdoor market, and many people don’t wish to stand in line on a hot day.

With The Market’s new online ordering process, Marble Creek Farmstead served 206 orders in one day.

“We are hiring more people,” the business said in a May 8 statement. “We’ve added four staff this week and need to add some more just to keep up with the demand. We’re super grateful for being able to do this. It’s really helped us. We were worried about being able to keep our business open, honestly, and this has just had such a great impact for us.”

Birmingham has what Executive Director Leigh Sloss-Corra calls a “car culture,” meaning that people are typically comfortable in their cars. Because of this, people in Birmingham quickly adapted to this new method of shopping for groceries at The Market, she said.

Sloss-Corra shared the drive-through design with 400 members of the Farmers Market Coalition in April. Farmers markets across the country are now looking at Birmingham’s innovation and testing this model.

“Some people still have a lower expectation from Southern cities, so when we do something that’s really smart and forward-thinking, scalable, logical and easy to copy, I think people are blown away,” Sloss-Corra said.

The Market at Pepper Place will continue to do the drive-through market through the summer and into the fall, Sloss-Corra said, and then will reevaluate its response to the pandemic for the next season. She said she anticipates incorporating pickup or ecommerce into the next season, even if the pandemic sees a drastic slowdown by fall.

“I’m pretty amazed and impressed at how adaptable and amazing our food community is,” Sloss-Corra said. “It’s been an education for the customers, and it’s like they just adapted and embraced it. You go through the pickup line, and people are still waving and smiling. Their hearts are still full.”

Being innovative and keeping The Market open in some form in 2020 was very important, according to organizers.

The Alabama farmers and makers who bring so much vibrancy to the state could disappear without the lifeline the market provides, a Sloss spokesperson said in May.

And it was “crucial” to preserve “the vital connection between farmers and the community” during the pandemic, said Market Founder Cathy Sloss Jones.

“We will adjust to continue helping current and future generations of farmers and local purveyors thrive and safely provide Alabamians with easy access to locally-grown, healthy foods,” Jones said recently.

Originally created to help save small Alabama farms, the Market started in 2000 with seven tents in a parking lot amid empty buildings, according to organizers.

It has been credited with helping to revitalize Pepper Place and the surrounding Lakeview district, which has become a hub in recent years for bars, eateries, retail shops and work spaces for creatives and entrepreneurs.

Organizers planned to officially recognize the 20th anniversary of the Market on Saturday, June 12, according to a news release. The Market was launched in the Pepper Place parking lot June 10, 2000.

Visit pepperplacemarket.com for more information and to order online.