Farmer’s Market v. Grocery Store—June Edition
On June 24th and 25th, I headed out to four of the largest weekend farmer’s markets in my home town of Colorado Springs to see what was available at this date, which is for us very early in the farmer’s market season, and what it cost. I then headed to the grocery store to see if I could find the same produce and do a head-to-head comparison. I checked prices both at our local regular-sort of grocery store, King Soopers, and then at the more upscale Whole Foods.
I couldn’t resist the beautiful beets and radishes from Wheeler Farm at the Colorado Farm and Art Market.
It’s 6:30 am on a Saturday morning and I’ve just forced myself get out of bed because it’s farmer’s market day. A yawn splits my face as I waddle into the kitchen, my eyes barely open. At this moment, I think, “Why do I do this to myself?” I could have used a couple more hours of sleep. But a half-hour later, as I’m driving to the farmer’s market, I’m smiling. I’m happy that I got up early enough to get the good stuff.
The farmer’s markets in Colorado Springs are small, and each one has its own distinct vibe and array of foods for sale. You have to get there early so that the vendors don’t run out of what you want. I get going on Saturday to make sure I get over to the Old Colorado City Farmer’s Market early enough to get eggs. I’ve sometimes wondered if it’s worth my time, shorting myself of some sleep, driving across town, and wandering around the market.
We live in the arid west and so farmer’s market produce isn’t quite as cheap as it is in my childhood home in southern Minnesota. Water is precious here, and has cost well over a century of legislation to allocate, major infrastructure investment to transport, and continued effort to manage. And therefore, the vegetables and fruits that are grown here are precious too. So am I actually saving any money by buying at the farmer’s market? Let’s find out.
The setup of my market comparison
I visited the Old Colorado City Farmer’s Market, the Colorado Farm & Art Market at the Margarita, the Downtown Sunday Market and the Promenade Shops at Briargate Farmer’s Market. I was surprised by the variety of produce I found. I was looking for primary ingredients—minimally or not processed. I found locally produced greens, peas, kale, beets, radishes, Swiss chard, onions, turnips, zucchini, peaches, cherries, apricots, honey, goat cheese, bison, beef, sausage, chicken and eggs. Locally produced for us means within the state—most of our veggies come from 10-50 miles east and south of Colorado Springs, but the fruit comes from the western slope of the Rockies. The Old Colorado City Farmer’s Market had the best fruit, and the greens & early root vegetables were best at the Margarita Market.
I was happily surprised by the Downtown Market, which had more vegetables than I expected, plus a local goat dairy (Jumpin’ Good Goat Dairy) selling at least 12 different varieties of goat cheese. I love goat cheese. And goats. So I was very excited about this find. And sorry, I have to include a baby goat picture here.
Some of these items I bought, and some I didn’t. I didn’t buy things I already had at home, of course. I did buy what my gut said were good deals and a couple of treats (namely the goat cheese). So I’m going to give you my score in two versions: how did I actually do with what I bought (let’s call this the “small cart”) and how would I have done if I’d bought some of every kind of fruit or vegetable plus the eggs and cheese (let’s call this the “large cart”)?
Here are the things I bought in the small cart:
Eggs
Honey
Cherries
Apricots
Cheddar Goat Cheese
“First Snow” Goat Cheese
Butter Lettuce
Red Kale
Peas
Beets
Green Onions
Calabacitas
The beets were especially amazing—I had enough greens to make veggie sides for 2.5 meals. Here’s what I could have added to create the large cart:
Mint
White Onions w/ Green Tops
Peaches
Swiss Chard
Turnips
Carrots
Bibb Lettuce
Lettuce
Baby Lettuce
Microgreens
If I’d bought the large cart, I would be eating salad for weeks! I excluded the meat to make my job simpler, and I excluded prepared foods like salsas and breads.
I also did my best to compare foodstuffs of similar quality. So what do I mean by quality? Farmer’s market items are generally organic, though often not certified organic because it’s too expensive for the farmers. The farmer’s market items are clearly local, though there was a guy at the Old Colorado City Market selling bananas. I don’t think those are local. Maybe someday that could happen, you know, with climate changing. I did ask at all the stands whether the produce was grown in Colorado and where, and I didn’t include any that was not grown in the state or in western Kansas.
Therefore, I tried to find either locally produced or organic options at the grocery store. This was not possible with all items, and I found that 57% of the items available at the farmer’s market were available in organic versions at the grocery store, and 48% of the items were available in local versions at the grocery store. I am incredibly lucky that both Whole Foods and King Soopers do a good job of labeling locally-produced food in the produce aisle. Thank you guys!! Just for fun, I added a comparison between the farmer’s market produce and the cheapest comparable items I could find at the grocery store. For you science geeks like me, note I also adjusted the prices for size of an item (for instance, the apricots or beets), where applicable.
Comparable quality
Aaaaaaand….the farmer’s markets win! If I had bought my groceries at the grocery store, I would have spent $66 compared to the $57 I actually forked over. This is a difference of $9 or a 14%. If I had bought the large cart, I would have spent $103 at the grocery store, but only $86 at the farmer’s market. This is a difference of $18 or 17%. About 57% of the farmer’s market items were less expensive than the grocery store. I was able to find very comparable goat cheeses at Whole Foods.
I was very surprised about this result and I found myself wondering why I didn’t expect it. I could come up with two potential answers. First, in our culture we equate bigger with cheaper. Costco is a great example—the store is big, sells big quantities, and therefore the items are cheap (at least per unit). Apply this logic to a small farmer’s market stand and you’d expect higher prices. Second, I expect high quality at the farmer’s market, and higher quality usually means higher price in our society. These two expectations are cultural and driven by how the majority of our food infrastructure is constructed and how we think markets work. But the farmer’s market breaks the system, cutting out the middle man (grocery stores and food distributors) and cutting out the cost of transportation. You don’t pay for these added costs when you pay the farmer direct.
Cheapest available
This result didn’t surprise me. My small cart would have cost $48 if I bought the cheapest possible produce at the grocery store…this included simple goat chèvre instead of the “first snow” specialty goat cheese and cow cheddar instead of goat cheddar. The difference is again $9 or 16%. However, if I had bought the large cart, I would have spent $81 and the difference would have been only $5 or 5%. Going for the cheapest item does save you money. Of course it would! But the difference in the big cart was a bit less than I expected.
So what can we get out of these numbers? This is what I’m taking home (for now) with my farmer’s market treasures: if you want to start buying more local and buying more organic ingredients, and especially if you aren’t as lucky as I am and your local market does not label point of origin, the farmer’s market is most likely going to save you money. Chances are, if you live in the Midwest, Pacific Northwest or the East Coast, farmer’s market prices will have a greater differential than mine did because water is free, and you are likely to save even more than I did. The numbers show that I got a great deal on the very specialty cheeses I bought, but these cheeses were on the pricey end of cheese in general. If you are only interested in the cheapest possible produce you can buy (and for some, this is necessary), then you are better off just going to the grocery store.
But hold on, is there more to consider besides the price tag?
Is the money you plunk down the only comparison worth thinking about? Are there other differences between grocery store and farmer’s market produce that impact your bottom line? We’ll ignore impacts to the environment for now and focus on immediate impacts on my life.
Time
I have to take the time to go to the farmer’s market. And here’s an overused mantra: time is money. It’s an extra trip. However, during peak produce season, I can buy most of my produce there, and sometimes I can even skip going to the regular grocery store, so it’s not even close to doubling the time I spend shopping.
Longevity
Farmer’s market produce lasts longer in your fridge. By the time produce gets here from California, it’s sometimes about to spoil. And if you are like me and try to hit up sale items in the produce section, you’ll learn there’s sometimes a reason it’s on sale…they have too much and it’s going to go bad soon. For instance, organic cilantro from King Soopers is often on sale for a great price, about 2/3 of normal prices. But it often goes bad when I’m about half-way through the bunch, so, though the initial price looks good, in the end, it doesn’t save me any money, and actually might be more expensive. Farmer’s market produce almost never spoils before I can use it.
Taste
Much of the farmer’s market produce tastes better. I have found this true especially of the honey, cherries, peaches and red peppers. At the farmer’s market, you are getting the produce within hours to a day from when it was picked, and it was picked at its peak ripeness, which improves flavor. What does this have to do with cost? Buying from the farmer’s market enriches my enjoyment of my food through flavor.
Ahavah Farm (https://www.ahavahfarm.com) had beautiful “beyond sustainable” sprouts for sale at the Downtown Market.
Nutrition
Though it’s not a certainty for any individual fruit or vegetable, the local produce is also likely to have more healthy nutrients than the California stuff. Here are a couple of examples why. Picking at the peak of ripeness means you are also getting the peak of nutrition. The longer it sits in a truck or on the shelf, the longer it has for the more delicate nutrients to degrade. Produce that needs to be transported long distances may be bred to withstand this process at the expense of nutritional quality. The Harvard T.H. Chan Center for Health and the Global Environment has a very approachable article on this topic if you want to read more about it. The farmer’s market is the shortest shelf-life and transportation chain you will find except for growing it yourself. And I’m sure anyone reading this blog understands that more nutritious food translates into lower medical bills long term.
Learning about seasonality
At the farmer’s market, each week, you learn what’s in season, and many of those products are also likely to be discounted at the grocery store. The stands selling non-local produce frustrate this process, but you can always ask, and people who grow their own produce or are selling it for local farmers they know are happy to talk about it.
At the Downtown Market, a bakery in Pueblo (The Sourdough Boulangerie) was selling produce, and I asked what’s up? Where does your produce come from, if you are in the business of making bread? They told me that they know several local farmers in Pueblo who do not have time to make it up to Colorado Springs on Sunday, so they offered to bring it for them and sell it at their stand. Fantastic!
Getting your James Brown “feel good” groove on
Going to the farmer’s market just feels good...that’s the reason I can get up early to go to the farmer’s market…I know and want that feeling. Even if I thought I might be spending a little more to shop at the market, I would still go. If you read my story on The Added Value of Making Your Own Cheese, you’ll understand what I mean when I say meeting farmers adds value to your produce. I get the same feeling of connectedness to community from both endeavors. I enjoy talking to my favorite farmers each week. Then there’s the added value of finding a local goat cheese producer who also hosts tours of his ranch…I can’t wait to go.
So is it worth my time and the early wake-up time on Saturday to shop at the farmer’s market? For me, even without the added benefits of the farmer’s market and hidden costs at the grocery store, saving $10 to $20 on my weekly grocery bill makes the time and early Saturday worth it. Guess I’ll be getting up early this Saturday…blink blink.
