The Warsaw Farmer’s Market has been a familiar outdoor business for 15 years and has plans to grow. It is a great attraction for people who want locally grown fresh produce, beef, plants, baked goods, eggs, jams, and crafts from vendors they know and trust. This year it will be open on Saturday mornings, 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM, from April 27 through the week after Labor Day.
“The market started back in 2009 when a group of people organized it,” said Market Manager Robert Gemes who has held his position for nine years. “It was first located at the Community Building parking lot, and then on Orscheln Farm & Home property (now part of the Bomgaars family of stores). For the past few years, it has been stationed in the J&D Pharmacy front parking lot. Each vendor is local and an independent businessperson handling his or her money. Many of the vendors are farmers, and they furnish their own canopies and tables. We are all people who enjoy talking to customers and each other. We have not grown much during our years of business, and we want to build up. We are looking for new vendors to join us.”
Gemes said that many vendors make or grow their products, and some get early produce and other products at nearby Amish auctions.
Jack Downing, who is in his 11th year of selling produce at the market, sells tomatoes, sweet corn, cucumbers, watermelon, and cantaloupes. He says that he buys a lot of produce from the Amish, but he also has his own garden. He likes the produce business and has been in it for 60 years. He said he sells his produce to be good, and if a customer finds something wrong with it, he will replace it.
Noah Long is in his fifth season as a vendor at the market and he estimates that there will be 12 to 15 vendors this year. He began helping a friend who sold products at the market while in high school. He now sells plants in the spring, produce in the summer and mums and pumpkins towards the fall. He also sells homemade Shagbark Hickory syrup and bread made by his dad.
“My dad makes dinner roll bread from a recipe he got when he attended South Elementary School,” said Long. “He makes both sour dough and wheat sour dough bread. I am one of the three big plant vendors at the market, and we bring in a lot of traffic. I provide local produce that I grow and buy from the Amish community in Versailles.”
Long said that he has a 30 by 86 foot tunnel for growing tomatoes in the ground that produces 500 tomato plants. He also has 80-foot gardens for Rhubarb and strawberries, and has 600 to 700 cucumbers. He just planted a small orchard of peach, pear and apple trees and is also putting in a fig orchard. Additionally, he has places for zucchini plants, hanging plants, flowers and more.
“I think of myself as a horticulturalist,” said Long. “I attended two years of college in the field of horticulture and left before getting my degree to get married. I do this kind of work full time until winter when I take other jobs such as lawn care. I sell produce to all schools in Warsaw, plus other schools in Wheatland, Leesville and to a church in Lincoln. I want to diversify and focus on wholesaling.”
The Warsaw Farmer’s Market group hasn’t decided if it will have a special celebration to celebrate its fifteenth year in business, but will continue to enjoy serving its customers with quality local products as it has in the past.
