The gymnasium was filled with vendors and customers milling around. People carried out baskets overflowing with greens and children swaddled in puffy coats and boots followed their parents around. Piano music played in the background, and the air smelled like herbs and pastries.
Heartland Family Farm’s table, run by Jessica Birtles, was filled with baskets of dark purple cabbage, small pumpkins, white and orange cauliflower and squash. Birtles talked to customers as she bustled about, selling produce and eggs. Her farm, owned and run by her family, has been selling at the summer, holiday and winter markets for 16 years. She’s done it for six.
“Typically in the winter, the farm is dormant ... it’s your rest period, both for you and for the land and for the animals,” she said, “so it’s really nice to have a winter market because it keeps you from going stir-crazy. You have something to do.”
Lots of people don’t realize the amount of local food still available in winter, said market master Kelsey Smith. She said it’s important for Bloomington to have a market during the cold months so farmers have a chance to keep selling their produce, and for people to have access to it.
“We have places that sell produce, but not produce that’s this fresh and unique,” she said.
Marcia Veldman, who manages the summer market, gets an opportunity to be a market vendor in the winter.
During the warmer months she doesn’t have time to sell at the Saturday market, so with the arrival of the winter market comes Veldman’s chance to show off her green thumb.
“I get a ridiculous amount of joy out of having a little stand at a market,” she said.
Birtles said this year’s milder temperatures have extended the growing season, leading to more produce. A killing frost which normally arrives at the end of November still hasn’t come.
“We’ve had green things weeks and weeks later than we should have,” she said. “We still have greens coming in from outside.”
Birtles’ sister Sarah McGee also runs a part of Heartland Family Farm, called McGee’s Heartland Farm. She helped her mother start the farm, and after growing up, getting married and obtaining her own land, she still raises animals and grows food to sell at the winter market. McGee also makes apple butter, dried herbs and teas and crafts like holiday wreaths and swags for decoration.
Success at a winter market depends on how hard one works in the late fall, McGee said. Some farmers keep growing in hoophouses throughout the winter, but she doesn’t. Instead, she freezes meat and some produce, and keeps things like squash and potatoes in a cool room in her barn.
“It’s really about being good in the fall and bringing it all in,” she said.
McGee said she enjoys the shelter of Harmony School, but that it poses a big space challenge. There isn’t enough parking for customers or lots of room for vendors, she said. But she said she does like the intimacy those issues create.
The most dedicated marketgoers come to the winter market, Veldman said. Though it seems weather wouldn’t be an issue because the event happens indoors, it still deters many from coming to Harmony every Saturday.
“You get the snow storm or an ice storm, or even really heavy rain, and people are less inclined to go to the extra effort to making it out here,” she said.
But that doesn’t stop the regulars who do tend to show up week after week.
“It’s definitely a smaller crowd,” she said. “But we’ve got a good customer base here.”
