All we can say is, what a success! On Thursday, August 8th, we had our first mini farmer’s market event, Peas Bring Your Friends, in the Salem Lot located outside of University Crossing. The event consisted of having our local partners gather together to share their products with the UMass Lowell and Lowell Community along with education on what their missions are within their businesses.
Our partners who attended were Mill City Grows, New England Beekeeping, Carolyn’s Farm Kitchen and Olympos Bakery. Both UMass Lowell and Lowell community members joined us in a fun and engaging day full of free samples, education from local vendors and the ability to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables along with different flavors of honey! Everyone who attended the event had to opportunity to sample three different flavored jams from Carolyn’s Farm Kitchen, different flavors of honey from New England Beekeeping and bread and oil from Olympos Bakery.
Why We Support Local Vendors
We wanted to highlight the importance of utilizing local vendors around the Lowell area to enhance localized community support. Each of our local vendors has a story tied into our mission, sustainable practices and community building. There are many benefits related to increasing awareness of utilizing local vendors. Reasons to support local vendors are for public benefits, keeping jobs and wages within the community, highlighting localized customer needs, and our favorite, environmental sustainability. You may be asking, why does supporting local vendors affect environmental sustainability?
Often times, local vendors are in either walking distance or just a short drive down the road decreasing the carbon footprint (vehicle gas) used to get there. Most large chain stores have to ship their items across states, the country or even overseas therefore using tons of fossil fuels which increase pollution. We hope to increase the use of local vendors to help our mission community building and the promotion of sustainable practices!
What’s Next?
We are hoping to have Farm Share pick-ups in conjunction with our mini Famer’s Markets in the future. As we partner with more local vendors, we are hoping that the markets will be even bigger and better as the season continues. There are a lot of exciting things coming to our Farm Share Program, stay tuned to what is coming next!