SOUTH ROYALTON — A nonprofit organization is bringing back the Royalton Farmers Market on a weekly basis.
Building a Local Economy, known as BALE, has received a $12,000 grant from the Jack and Dorothy Byrne Foundation to put toward food access programs, Elena Greenlee, BALE’s executive director, said in a Wednesday phone interview.
The majority of that grant will go toward hosting the Royalton Farmers Market every Sunday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. from June 7 through Sept. 27 on the South Royalton Green, located at 194 Chelsea St. (There is no market on Sept. 20, which coincides with the Tunbridge World’s Fair).
The funding allowed BALE to hire Keri Ryan, an experienced market manager who also oversees Woodstock’s weekly Market on the Green.
“There seems to be a real coming together in the community that wants to spend time together in this space,” Ryan said in a phone interview along with Greenlee.
Royalton has had a farmers market since the early 2000s and it was typically held weekly on Thursdays or Fridays, Greenlee said. After losing vendors to other market opportunities and lack of attendance, it shut down completely in 2023 and 2024.
BALE — a community resource center that focuses on sustainability and local economic development, among other topics — conducted a community survey, which indicated that respondents would like the farmers market to be biweekly and take place on Sundays, Greenlee said, so BALE decided to give it a try. The organization adopted that schedule when it brought back the market last year.
“I think from the vendor side, it went really well,” Greenlee said, adding that vendors who used to participate in the farmers market when it took place on a weekday reported an increase in sales when it switched to Sundays. “From the community end, it was really beautiful and very joyful.”
The biweekly markets also included children’s activities and live music.
“We tried to approach the farmers market as a community gathering and an opportunity to bring cultural vibrancy as well as economic vibrancy to the town,” Greenlee said.
While there was interest in having it take place weekly, BALE did not have the staff or organizational capacity to make it happen.
Then, they received the grant from the Byrne Foundation. BALE contacted vendors to gauge their interest in participating on a weekly basis.
Vendors, particularly those that sell produce, were excited because it helps them to build a base of consistent customers who can enter into a “predictable rhythm” of picking up produce every week; the biweekly basis made it harder to sustain those relationships, Greenlee said.
As of last Wednesday, 33 vendors had signed up and she said there will likely be 20 vendors at the market each Sunday. The offerings range from produce to meat to prepared food to art, among others.
“We’re just excited to have people participating,” Ryan said.
Ryan is working to build relationships with vendors and provide more consistency.
“It takes a lot of the guesswork off of our plates,” Greenlee said, adding that there is no one on BALE’s staff with experience managing farmers markets. “We were kind of winging it last year.”
This year, patrons will be able to use funding they receive on their Electronic Benefits Transfer, or EBT, cards through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, at the farmers market.
There also will be live music and other workshops at the market each week.
The Royalton Farmers Market is still accepting vendor applications. For more information, visit balevt.org/farmersmarket.
