Why The Nashville Farmer’s Market Says Its Empty Produce Shed Is A Good Thing

This week, the warm weather gave Walter Gentry of Bellevue a hankering for peaches. So he drives to the Nashville Farmer’s Market and is surprised not to find peaches or much of any produce.

“There’s nothing here. There’s no farmers,” Gentry says with a laugh.

The empty produce sheds are the result of a policy decision made in January. The city-run facility chose to follow a national trend and become a
“producer-only” market, banning vendors who simply buy produce from the same warehouses that supply local grocery stores. Those fruits and vegetables come from all over the country, even Mexico.

“I think that there are a lot of people that come to the market and they make assumptions that because they’re at a farmer’s market, everything is either locally or regionally grown and that the person they’re buying it from is the farmer, but that hasn’t been the case at this market for a very long time,” says market director Tasha Kennard, who took over a year-and-a-half ago.

There’s been a mix of farmers, but Kennard says they were disadvantaged. Many customers were drawn to the stalls of resellers, who had more variety and sometimes lower prices.

The resellers resisted the ban on their presence for obvious reasons, but farmers like Mike Baudinot embraced it, even though it means some restrictions on what they can sell.

“It helps out Tennessee farmers. Right now, there’s not that many farmers left.”

Baudinot is one of the 46 farmers to go through the
lengthy application process to sell at the market, which now includes a site visit to each farm. Last year, when resellers were still allowed, only 10 farmers rented stalls.

While peak season may offer more selection, right now only a few farmers are set up during the week, and they’re primarily selling strawberries. Few farmers have anything to harvest at this point in the Tennessee growing season. Some are just now beginning to plant.

“I think we just all need to give it the time that it needs,” Kennard says.

Market staffers say customers will have to adjust their expectations. If they want to meet the farmer who grew a product, they can’t expect to have watermelons in April or peaches in May.

“It’s not peach season,” Kennard says. “As much as I’d love to have a peach right now, they’re not ready.”