The Adams County Small Business Incubator: The ACFM and its Community Mission
By Wilson Schultz
The Adams Country Farmers Market in Gettysburg, PA, which is held every Saturday throughout the summer, serves as a jumping-off point for many local businesses looking to get their starts. The market allows vendors to join a sustainable community and promote their products to businesses in the Gettysburg area without having to first sell to a wholesale provider.
The Adams County Farmers Market (ACFM), which is open from 8 am-1 pm every Saturday in the summer to early fall, has more than 20 vendors come to sell their products every weekend. The vendors range from small business owners trying to get their starts in a new area to long-time businesses who have been present in the Adams country community for a long time.
Take Liz Dodson, also known as the Kombucha Lady, who is in her first year of selling at the ACFM. Dodson is able to sell her fresh, “never pasteurized, [and] raw” kombucha to consumers which helps her spread her business and use the market “as a jumping-off point to get into the shops around Gettysburg”. It allows her to “have a better product. [which lets] you have a healthier product” than what you might find in larger grocery stores around the area. As I looked around the market that Saturday morning I noticed the chatter of generational divides within the ethically mixed crowd. Conversations between buyers and vendors made it hard to find a transaction without conversation involved. Dodson credits this “balance of demographics present” at the ACFM to the increase in business she has seen.
Another first-year vendor at the market is Fiddlers Green farm. Fiddlers Green is a sustainability-focused CBD producer that has goals of “sustainable practices towards fully restorative agriculture” as well as “support[ing] the vitality of our community” (Fiddlers Green Farm 2021). Barb Levy, who was working the booth last Saturday, attributes their success at the market to its “community of vendors”. Fiddlers Green is operated mainly out of farmers markets, Mrs. Levy told me, and just that day they had three separate locations for their product at three different farmers markets around the southern PA and MD area. Fiddlers Green and many other businesses are able to stay “small and local” because of markets held around the area.
The community itself cultivates an environment of sustainable agribusiness, even if the vendors don’t necessarily preach sustainability themselves. Since most vendors bring their products straight to the market, they don’t have to create unnecessary plastic waste when shipping food to stores or food waste if their products go bad on their way to the supermarket.
Reja Djalal, the market manager, says that “the more prominent the market becomes, the greater impact it can have” on both the community and the sustainability of Adams County. The ACFM takes advantage of Gettysburg’s tourism and agriculture markets and combines them into agritourism. The market itself leans into the fact that most of the food is coming from 20-30 miles away and uses its own seasonality to bolster the sustainability of the fresh products being sold.
The Farmers Market coalition found in a study that 3 out of 4 local farms “use practices consistent with organic standards and 81% incorporate healthy soil practices” (Farmers Market Coalition 2021). The fact that most vendors travel from so close also reduces carbon emissions that would be expended while shipping the food. Not only this, but by supporting these local farms, consumers are supporting more sustainable agriculture than what is practiced in larger operations.
Mr. Djalal also called the ACFM a “small business incubator,” as most vendors use it as a jumping-off point for their businesses. As it states on the ACFM website “a farmers market is a catalyst for entrepreneurial opportunities and cultivates new business growth” (ACFM 2021). This is especially helpful to small business owners during the pandemic as the market has seen a 42% increase in sales and is still on track to increase.
Thanks to the low barrier to entry into the market, many vendors can use the increase in business that the ACFM has seen to their advantage to help them see success during the pandemic. Businesses can either sign up to be a full season, half-season, or guest vendors, each of which has varying prices for a 10×10 space to set up in. Some vendors can also apply for price reductions on their space if they meet certain sustainable qualifications such as a “Plastic Bag Avoidance” (ACFM 2021).
Supporting the Adams County Farmers Market and other local markets supports the sustainable practices that most local farmers utilize. These markets serve as a perfect starting point for those who would rather keep their business small, and community-supported, and allow consumers to choose healthier, better made, and more sustainable products than what they would normally find at a normal supermarket.
This story was updated on Oct. 7, 2021. The primary changes include removing a summary sentence from para. 3, adding a description of the market from my personal experience, shortening hyperlinks within quotes, and removing a sentence from the final paragraph for conciseness.
Source:
Farmers markets. Climate Central. (2018, December 10). Retrieved September 23, 2021
Mission. Adams County Farmers Markets. (n.d.). Retrieved September 23, 2021
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