I have my own market or produce stand which ever you want to call it. This will be season no. 23 for our farm and wouldn't do it any other way. We are open every day but Monday from about July 15 to Oct 15. I don't have to worry about competing with other vendors that want to sell their stuff cheap, or spend time hauling, setting up or taking down. I have a walk in cooler so vegs are picked in the morning and cooled and have 2 swamp coolers running in the stand so vegs stay fresher and customers are more comfortable. Probably the thing that pleases me the most is the relationships we have developed with our customers, small children from when we started are now bringing their children to our stand and on the flip side, the hardest part, watching customers decline or suffer loses in their lives. We had a bad storm on August 3, 2013, total destruction of the vegs, minutes after the storm had passed customers showed up and were asking what they could do to help. They started what they called a seed fund, against my wishes, and raised a lot of money. But probably the most moving part was a church group of about 30 volunteers, from 8-80 years old, showed up and cleared my field in about 3 hours. We have truly been blessed and I consider myself one of the lucky few that are doing what they were meant to do. We have a Facebook page called Chapmans Produce if anyone wants to visit. Not a lot on it, always too busy, but am hoping to do better in the future.
Good luck
Marcus
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