The farmers’ market as of late has become an assemblage of products that students do not need much of. As the recent article stated, the popsicle man is the only one who gets a respectable amount of business. I personally have an interest in the pasta booth, but for the prices he charges I can make my own for significantly less.
In regards to the honey and wax stand, there simply aren’t all that many people on campus who use those products. The general campus population doesn’t make their own sandwiches for lunch of anything of that sort where they would use those products. Furthermore, honey and waxes last for quite a while before you need to buy more. Then there’s always the smattering of ready-to-eat stands that offer their goods to students. I don’t know about the other students on campus, but I typically have little interest in those.
I would love to see more typical farmers’ market stands, offering the more typical items. By that, I mean that I would love to be able to buy fresh fruit and vegetables (even though they’re not in season for long), and I’d love to see a local butcher taking orders for pickup or delivery at a later date. However, as much as I would love to see these venders come to campus, I have my doubts that enough of the campus community knows how to (and actually does) cook well enough for these vendors to make enough of a profit to make it worthwhile for them to come to our relatively small community.
Lastly, I’ve found that there are indeed are a lot of people at Tech that have no idea that the farmers’ market even exists. However, these are typically the people who cook fairly infrequently; I therefore have my doubts that increased awareness would benefit Tech’s Farmers’ Market significantly.
May the wholesomeness of the country make it to our campus.
Collin Strassburger
Third-year AE