Delivery or CSA anyone? Lee’s Summit Farmers Market vendors adapt to delayed start

Karin Velez understands the uniqueness of her work environment during the COVID-19 crisis.

In many ways, it’s strangely unchanged for the owner of Wolf Creek Family Farm, located in Peculiar.

“Our farming days have looked pretty much like they always do,” Velez says. “People keep asking us how we’re handling the stay-at-home orders, but, honestly, we’re always home during this time of the year because we’re working either in the greenhouse or in the fields. The big change has been not going to markets on Wednesday and Saturday.”

That’s a big change for farmers and patrons who have become regulars at the Lee’s Summit Farmers Market. Like just about everything else, the farmers market has been put on hold.

“We became aware in early March that events were going to be very different due to the COVID-19 outbreak,” says Ashley Nowell, assistant director of Downtown Lee’s Summit Main Street.

With input from the Jackson County Health Department, the organization decided the market would not open as planned on April 6.

Downtown Lee’s Summit Main Street runs the farmers market, which operated last year from the beginning of April through the end of November.

The market has been a community mainstay in Downtown Lee’s Summit for 28 years. It had grown to include 39 vendors on Saturday mornings and 17 vendors on Wednesday mornings. Vendors offer products such as locally grown produce, grass-fed meats, honey, soap and candles, canned goods, and juice. All products must be produced in Missouri or within 150 miles of Lee’s Summit.

The farmers market now has a tentative opening date of May 16.

“We will be in communication with the City of Lee’s Summit and the Jackson County Health Department to determine if it is safe for the market to open on May 16,” Nowell says, adding they expect added guidelines to follow in order to open.

In the meantime, other plans had to be made. After all, it’s still spring and vegetables are growing.

Nowell says vendors were asked to consider delivery or pick-up options, as well as pre-orders and pre-payments. To help, Downtown Lee’s Summit Main Street is currently promoting 18 vendors on its website: www.downtownls.org/market that are doing either deliveries or pick-ups.

In addition, a few vendors are operating Community Supported Agriculture, or CSAs, where a customer pays a fee upfront for produce, meat or eggs throughout the season.

“Our vendors have been very understanding and cooperative as we’ve made these adjustments,” Nowell says. “Many of our vendors had to change their business model quickly to accommodate pre-ordering. They have done a great job being flexible during this time.”

Flexibility is important, as the market is critical for many farmers.

Lee’s Summit is the largest of the five farmers markets where Velez sells items. Wolf Creek Farms has been a vendor twice a week in Lee’s Summit since 2008, only a year after the farm was started.

“The Lee’s Summit market is our longest-running market during the season with the most customers,” Velez says. “It’s also the site with the most CSA subscriptions. Needless to say, it’s an important part of our business.”

Velez is very active in the operations of the market and she says she takes a special interest in the vendors and customers.

“It’s a community event twice per week and an essential part of how many people get their fresh produce, meats, baked goods, and other items for their families,” she says.

“I am anxious for this virus situation to be resolved so we can get back to providing the community with what they need and provide a way for our local farmers and producers to sell their goods.”

In previous years, Velez said they were ready to go in April.

“When the decision was made to delay opening the market until May 16, we needed to think fast and quickly find a way to get our customers the goods they need and to move our product. We pivoted to making home deliveries and quickly put together an online ordering platform for delivery to select cities.

“We’re also offering items from other farmers who may not have their own website or who can’t do deliveries,” Velez adds. “It’s a contact-free system, so folks just place a cooler on their porch and we deliver the items to their door.”

Velez says making deliveries twice a week is “a whole other animal.

“I miss greeting our customers after not seeing them all winter,” Velez said. “I miss working with the other vendors to provide a great experience for those customers. I miss answering growing questions or giving recipe suggestions.”

Farmers markets, Velez said, are more than just a place to shop.

“It’s a community experience that forges solid relationships between people and the farmers, ranchers and bakers they get their food from.”

Katie Farrar, another vendor at the Lee’s Summit Farmers Market, agrees.

Katie and her husband, Gabe, own Farrar Family Farms, a livestock farm in Adrian, Mo. The Farrars started grass-based farming about nine years ago, and then turned it into direct-to-consumer meat sales six years ago.

Katie Farrar says being a vendor was the only way she and her husband knew to get their products in front of customers.

“Once we joined the tribe of local farmers, we felt that we had found a family of sorts,” Katie Farrar says. “While we feel it is important to have an online presence, nothing can replace the stories or recipes we share with our customers or the connections we get to make with their families.

“One of the biggest rewards for us is hearing our customers tell us how much they enjoy and appreciate our products and the hard work that went into it. Seeing their kids each week and knowing that those are the faces we are working hard to raise clean food for gives us so much motivation and delight in our work.”

But COVID-19 has required changes.

“We have had to adapt just like everyone else in these difficult times,” Katie Farrar says. “For us, it’s important to react and adapt in a way that is sustainable and realistic for us as a small family-run business and in a way that benefits our customers.

“It’s calculated adaptation and it’s what farmers, in particular, do best. It’s the literal nature of our job. We try to keep in mind that the changes we make could potentially stick with our business for the long haul instead of just a quick fix for the next few weeks or months.”

The Farrars have always offered the option to place pre-orders for pick up at the farmers market. Now they are offering home delivery for a small fee, or once-a-month on-farm pick-ups through scheduled appointments.

“This spring has been vastly different than a typical spring,” Gabe Farrar says. “By not having our normal sales avenues at the market it has added a level of stress as we rush around trying to figure out how to get our products to families.

“Dealing with nature, weather and seasonality has taught us to adapt and think on our feet in production. But, this pandemic and its effects on society have forced us to do that in our sales, marketing, and delivery methods.”

This story was originally published April 21, 2020 at 12:00 AM.