Market Farming

[Road's End Farm <organic87 AT frontiernet.net>]

Warning -- the below is also long; those who aren't interested, please  
skip this!

Does the market have written bylaws, and if so can you get a copy? The  
people currently running it may be in clear violation. Whether being  
able to prove this will get you anywhere useful is likely to depend on  
other factors. (I know one case -- see third paragraph -- in which the  
bylaws just mysteriously disappeared.)

How, if at all, is the market formally organized? Who "owns" the  
rights to the market name / organization? If the people who started  
it, and who are not running it well, effectively own the market,  
there's not likely to be much you can do about this one; in which  
case, your choices are a) to try to start another in the same area,  
which in a small town is most likely impractical unless the old one is  
clearly dying and maybe even then b) to put up with it as is (possibly  
working around the edges as best you can to change things) and hope  
things improve eventually c) to, as you say, give up on this market  
entirely, and either apply to the other one or try other marketing  
methods.

Do you have effective support from other vendors? By "effective", I  
mean, if they're unhappy with the current situation, will they do more  
than just grumble? If you have significant effective support, and if  
the bylaws and market organization allow for it, I'd be inclined to  
try to stage a coup: run a slate of reform candidates for the board,  
and hope to get a majority. If you can't come up with enough such  
candidates to potentially take a majority, however, that won't work.  
(In a similar situation some years ago, I discovered that when it came  
down to it nobody but me was willing to do anything but grumble. I  
quit that market; but it was 45 minutes away in a different town. I'm  
not sure what I would have done if it had been in my hometown.) -- it  
occurs to me, depending on how the bylaws/organization (if any) are  
written, the other candidates might not need to be vendors; but I  
think you would still need significant support among the vendors, or  
there's going to be too much bad will to get anything done. If you  
lose a couple of disgruntled people, that's one thing; but if most of  
the current vendors disagree with you, you'd need not only to take  
over the board, but to find a whole new set of vendors.

As far as the rules requiring that all board members need to attend  
every market: this is just silly. A board and a market manager are not  
the same thing. If the market can't afford a paid market manager, a  
volunteer, or a combination of volunteers, needs to do the job; and  
these people can certainly be board membors -- they can even be  
vendors, if it's a small market that generally runs smoothly; although  
this isn't ideal it works quite well for one market I go to. But there  
needs to be one clear person in authority at any given market day, not  
a board meeting every time there's a minor dispute! (though there does  
need to be a clear appeals process to the entire board, in writing, to  
protect against a possible terrible manager.) A manager and assistant  
manager could divide the duty so neither of them needs to be there  
every time. If you try to stage a coup, I'd make changing this rule  
part of the platform; and make it clear what process you want to  
change it to.

In fact, if you try to stage a coup, you might start by writing up a  
draft of proposed bylaws and market rules, and then (this is very  
important) pass it around current vendors for comment and suggestions  
-- and then listen, hard, to the comments and suggestions, and  
incorporate what seems like a good idea; so that it doesn't come  
across as you, a new vendor, trying to take over the market as an  
individual. (I'm sure people on this list can give you suggestions on  
sample bylaws and rules to start from.) Then run on that platform.  
But, bear in mind, if this fails you will certainly be badly in dutch  
with the current administration and may get thrown out of the market.

Good luck with this mess, in any case. There are such things as  
properly functioning producer-only markets; I know several of them in  
this area alone (and it sounds as if the market you used to work with  
is another). Whether it's possible to get one in any particular town  
is sometimes a different matter.


-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale