KY Farmers Market Toolkit: Stage 3

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Once your market is a stable business, there are many ways you can grow your market by hiring a market manager, developing community partners, creating a “Friends of the Market”, developing children’s programs, securing grant funding, business training for your vendors and reaching out to new income populations.

1. Hiring, Training, & Managing a Market Manager

Quick Tips for Hiring, Training, and Managing a Market Manager: Here’s a quick reference guide about what it takes to hire, train, and manage a market manager.

Hiring a Market Manager:

Training and Managing Your Market Manager:

  • Market Manager FAQ from the Farmers Market Coalition.
  • Making Your Market Manager Matter. In this CFA Farmers Market Support Program webinar, we discuss how to measure the impact for the position and prove value. This webinar is designed to provide you with a work-plan framework giving your manager action items and ‘measurables’ over the course of the season to track progress and results.
  • Farmers Market Manager Skills: This guide from the University of California Small Farm Center helps a farmers market define a market manager’s roles and responsibilities and then gives the manager resources to help build their skills for a successful farmers market.
  • Farmers Market Training Manual:  This manual from the Farmers Market Federation of New York is a great place to start if you are wondering what a manager’s job description should include. It’s also an excellent resource to help market managers define their scope of work as well as a source for helpful tips on how to manage and grow a market.
  • The Mighty Market Manager: This publication from the Washington State Farmers Market Management Toolkit will give you tips about a market manager job description, training, and compensation.
  • Ontario Market Manager Certification Program is a professional development course conceived by Farmers’ Markets Ontario and developed in conjunction with Michelle Wolf, a certified coach, business owner, and former farmers’ market manager. The course material is in a series of 12 webinars that are 60 to 90 minutes in length. There are no deadlines to meet. You learn at your own pace. There is a cost of $200.

2. Develop Community Partners

When farmers markets prioritize community partnership development, they are solidifying the market’s place within the community as a space for economic vitality, food access, relationship building, and general prosperity. View this webinar or this blog post from CFA’s Farmers Market Support Program to learn how you can harness your community to create an even better market!

3. Fundraising

  • Quick Tips for Fundraising at Your Farmers Market
  • Strategic Planning to Meet Your Funding Raising Goals: Here is a strategic guide to fundraising from the Washington Farmers Market Association.
  • Webinar: Financial Freedom Through Fundraising. In this webinar, Whitley County FM Volunteers Sandi Curd (Kentucky Highlands Investment Corporation) and Kristin Smith (Wrigley Taproom in Corbin, KY and Faulkner Bent Farm) present on the diversity of options before you and your market!
  • Webinar: Raise Money and Build Community with Engaging Online Fundraising: In this webinar hosted by the Farmers Market Coalition, Caroline Fiore, Development Manager at Farm Aid, will guide market leaders on a variety of techniques and strategies for online fundraising, including hosting effective and engaging online events.
  • Fund Raising: Here’s a link to several more resources from the Farmers Market Coalition.
  • Farm to Fork Grant Program: Host a fundraiser with the help of the Kentucky Proud Farm to Fork Program. The Farm to Fork program works to increase the awareness of the local food movement by partnering with organizations to benefit a charity in their community. The grant reimburses up to $750.00 of the event’s eligible Kentucky-produced food products and associated promotional expenditures. This is a helpful grant to consider if you are doing a farm-to-table fundraiser for your market.

4. Grant Funding

  • KCARD Monthly Funding Newsletter: Subscribe to this newsletter and get the latest information about a variety of funding opportunities for Kentucky farmers markets and Kentucky small farmers. Also, see their Farmers Market Funding Possibilities webpage.
  • USDA Grant Resources: This page is maintained by the USDA and contains a list of funding opportunities and resources available to the public.
  • Community Farm Alliance (CFA) Market Manager Cost Share Program: This grant funds up to $2,000 for a market manager with a 1:1 cost share.
  • Community Food Projects (CFP) USDA Community Food Projects provide funding from $10,000-$300,000 to non-profits, tribal organizations, or public food program service providers.  Successful applications will involve collaborative partners working together to solve healthy food access issues that affect low-income persons.
  • Farmers Market Promotion Program This USDA program provides up to $250,000 or $500,000 “to increase domestic consumption of and access to locally and regionally produced agricultural products and to develop new marketing opportunities for farm operations serving local markets by developing, improving, and providing outreach, training, and technical assistance.”  Farmers markets are eligible to apply and no match is required.
  • Kentucky Double Dollars: The Kentucky Double Dollars Program gives farmers market customers the ability to double the value of their federal nutrition benefits (SNAP, WIC, and SFMNP) to purchase fresh, local food.
  • Kentucky Department of Agriculture Grants: Here’s a list of grants offered through the KDA including the Kentucky Proud Promotion (POP) grant and the Farm to Fork grant.
  • Rural Business Development Grants: Institutions of higher education, rural cooperatives, towns and communities, and state and local governments are eligible to apply for $10,000-$100,000 for activities such as planning, training, technical assistance, construction, and equipment. Requests for funding should focus on ways to improve rural community economic development, such as increasing the purchase and consumption of local produce.

5. Friends of the Market Toolkit

This toolkit was created by the Federation of New York Farmer Markets. A Friends of the Market gives market supporters a greater connection to the market, with a strong sense of ownership; creates an additional source of income for the market; and provides additional manpower for the market.

6. Children’s Programs at Your Farmers Market

  • This is a publication from Washington State about starting a kids program.
  • Power of Produce (POP) The Farmers Market Coalition (FMC) provides a set of over 50 tools, guides, and templates to help communities engage younger customers in the farmers market experience through POP Club. To have access to the tools, one must be an FMC member market.
  • Example of “veggie bucks” where kids can purchase fresh fruits and vegetables at the farmers’ market:
    • Morgan County, KY: To address the high rate of obesity and chronic disease in Morgan County, Extension personnel, homemaker volunteers, The Morgan County Diabetes Coalition, and Morgan County Farmers Market members collaborated on the “Kids Veggie Bucks” program.
    • KERNEL (Kids Eating Right and Nutrition and Exercise for Life): A youth-oriented nutrition and physical activity program in Washington State designed to engage children in learning about lifelong healthy eating habits, gardening, and exercise.
    • Overview of Kentucky Farmer’s Market Incentives and Engagement from Partnership for a  Fit KY includes information about a  kid’s veggie bucks program.

7. Recruiting Vendors and Helping Them Grow Their Businesses

  • Quick Tips for Attracting New Farmers to Your Market: Here’s a resource for helping markets in Kentucky locate and recruit farmers to their market.
  • Selling Farm Products at Farmers Markets: Here are tips and resources for improving farmers market sales from the Center for Crop Diversification at the University of Kentucky. Also, see their Farmers Market Weekly Price Reports that list prices for common products that are currently being charged at a selection of Kentucky farmers’ markets so that your vendors can make informed decisions when setting prices.
  • Kentucky State University: Third Thursday Thing is Kentucky State University Land Grant Program’s monthly sustainable agriculture workshop. The goal is to improve the sustainability of agriculture on Kentucky’s small, limited-resource, female, and minority farms. Workshops are held on the 3rd Thursday of each month (except December).
  • The Kentucky State University (KYSU) Center for the Sustainability of Farms and Families (CSFF) offers grant programs that help farmers who want to improve their farming operations, improve the marketability of their products with value-added enterprise, and who want to further their farming and agricultural knowledge through educational trainings.
  • Community Farm Alliance’s Farmers Market Resiliency Program (FMRP) is a customized training and support program for farmers market vendors as well as farmers market board members, and market managers, to increase long-term resiliency at Kentucky farmers market.
  • Grow Appalachia works with Kentucky farmers and offers free technical support to small farmers in southeast Kentucky to help farmers meet their production goals.
  • The Organic Association of Kentucky offers farmers educational, technical, and market resources to help organic farmers grow their businesses. They host field days, assist with organic transition, and provide an annual conference.
  • Kentucky State University and the University of Kentucky Extension Services offer technical support and resources to farmers in the counties they serve.
  • Cornell Small Farms Program: Resources from Cornell Small Farm Program for starting and growing a small farm business
  • Standing Out at a Farmers’ Market: Recommendations for improving farmers market sales from Penn State Extension Service.

8. Low Income Outreach

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is administered by the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) and serves as the nation’s largest domestic hunger safety net. FNS works with state-level agencies and partners to inform the public of nutrition assistance opportunities, sign up beneficiaries, and ensure program integrity. To receive SNAP benefits, eligible individuals must apply through their states. In order for a farmers market to accept SNAP payments, they need to apply for an FNS number and obtain Electronic Benefits Transaction (EBT) processing equipment. To apply for SNAP for your farmers market Click Here.

Help with Applying to Become Eligible to Receive SNAP:

Legal Issues Regarding SNAP :

  • IRS ruling 6050W on 1099k IRS electronic reporting requirements for farmers markets. This rule requires all electronic card processors to issue 1099K’s to all merchants accepting electronic payments. This includes all credit, debit, and food stamp payments. Here are some tests to determine if you are exempt under this rule clarification:
  1. Do you have 50 or more farmers and vendors accepting and redeeming tokens?
    • If yes, continue to number 2
    • If no, then you are exempt from issuing 1099-Ks to your farmers and vendors.
  2. Do you have any farmers or vendors to whom you make reimbursements 200 or more times during the year AND the total reimbursement exceeds $20,000?
    • If yes, then you must issue a 1099-K only to those particular vendors.
    • If no, then you are exempt.
  • For help understanding and complying with SNAP requirements, and to find answers to frequently asked SNAP-related questions, explore the Farmers Market Legal Toolkit regard SNAP.

Free SNAP/EBT Processing Equipment:

  • From Kentucky: FIS/Verifone wireless machines are available through a free state program. They operate on AT&T cell networks and are completely free but only run EBT, without fees. To find out if you qualify for free EBT equipment from the state, contact LaShana Watson, Department of Community Based Services, Division of Family Support, 502-564-3440 ext.3700 or by email lashana.watson@ky.gov.
  • From the USDA: The national MarketLink free machine program offers one free year (or twelve non-consecutive months) of free access to the Novo Dia/TotilPay app that can be integrated with Square to also run credit/debit cards, and cards can be entered manually or run using a free Bluetooth reader. The app can be downloaded on any phone or iPad (but only one at a time), and after the initial free year, the license fee for the software is $20/month or $191/year with no long-term contract (so you can do a monthly subscription for just the market season if needed). Novo Dia also offers access to an online portal for transaction reports/data.

SNAP/FNS Reauthorization

  • When does a market need to be reauthorized? If your market has changed locations, owners/Responsible Officials, or closed, please contact the SNAP Retailer Service Center at 1-877-823-4369.
  • 5-Year Review: If your market is due for a 5-year review, you will receive notification from FNS. FNS is responsible for reviewing retailer applications at least once every five years to ensure that each firm is under the same ownership and continues to meet eligibility guidelines. In order to accomplish this regulatory requirement, form FNS-252-R is used for reauthorization. In addition to these forms, during authorization or reauthorization, FNS may conduct an on-site store visit of the firm. The store visit of the firm helps FNS confirm that the information provided on the application is correct. An FNS representative or store visit contractor obtains permission to fill in the store visit checklist, photograph the store, and asks the store owner or manager about the continued ownership of the store.

EBT: Using Paper Vouchers

If your market should experience the loss of a wi-fi connection or difficulty with processing EBT by machine, paper vouchers can be used. See this guide to learn more about ordering and processing vouchers. All markets that accept SNAP benefits should keep a supply of vouchers along with a print copy of this guide with their EBT processing equipment. The phone number to process vouchers in Kentucky is 888-979-9949. For more information go to: http://www.ebtedge.com.

Senior & WIC Farmers Market Nutrition Program (FMNP)

The FMNP provides eligible shoppers with vouchers/food instruments for fresh, Kentucky grown fruits and vegetables

  • WIC (Women, Infant, and Children) Click this link to the WIC FMNP handbook from Kentucky Public Health. WIC FMNP provides participants in the WIC Program with preprinted food instruments (FIs) to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables and fresh-cut cooking herbs at local farmers markets. WIC participants receive the nutritional benefits of fresh fruits and vegetables in addition to the regular WIC food package. The local farmers are reimbursed for the face value of the FIs which enhances their earnings and supports their participation in the farmers markets. For more information about the WIC FMNP, contact Alan Peck, Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program Coordinator, Dept. for Public Health, Nutrition Services Branch. Phone: 502-564-2945. Alan.Peck@ky.gov.
  • Ideas to increase WIC Redemption Rates at your Market: tips from KDA FMNP
  • Senior FMNP: Low-income seniors are issued coupons for the purchase of fresh, unprocessed produce from participating farmers’ markets. For more information, contact Jesse Frye with the Kentucky Department of Agriculture at jesse.frye@ky.gov

Attracting Low Income Customers to Your Market

  • The Community Farmers Alliance Kentucky Double Dollars: The Kentucky Double Dollars Program gives farmers market customers the ability to double the value of their federal nutrition benefits (SNAP, WIC, and SFMNP) to purchase fresh, local food.
  • The University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service Farmers’ Market Toolkit: This toolkit is a research-based resource developed to make local, fresh fruit and vegetables more accessible to limited resource Kentuckians through farmers’ markets. It includes an assessment tool to help market leadership identify measures they can take to improve marketing to this audience.   The assessment addresses the market’s promotional practices, acceptance of nutrition program benefits, implementation of incentive programs, access, appearance and safety, and community engagement.  The toolkit provides resources to help markets address those issues they choose to pursue.   This toolkit is ONLY available through your county’s extension offices.
  • Quick Tips” for attracting WIC & SNAP recipients to your market.
  • Kentucky Guide to Incentive Programs  A PowerPoint presentation created by the Partnership for Fit Kentucky to promote access to healthy foods at farmers markets.
  • Good and Cheap Cookbook: Recipes designed to fit the budgets of people living on SNAP.
  • The FreshLink Ambassador (FLA) Model is a peer-to-peer marketing approach effectively reaching key target populations. The Cleveland, OH pilot program targeted neighborhoods where 30% or more of the residents received SNAP and that were located within one mile of a farmers’ market that had a SNAP incentive program. Overall, farmers’ markets paired with a FreshLink Ambassador had greater improvements in SNAP sales compared to farmers’ markets without a FreshLink Ambassador. This website has manuals and resources to help a community start their own ambassador program.

Other Food Incentive and Food Assistance Programs

  • For an overview of nutrition incentive programs see the Nutrition Incentives 101 on the Nutrition Incentive Hub which is a coalition created by the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program Training, Technical Assistance, Evaluation, and Information Center (GusNIP NTAE).
  • GleanKY bridges the gap between programs working with food-insecure populations and sources of excess fresh fruits and vegetables. Volunteers pick up produce that can’t be sold but is otherwise perfectly edible and deliver it to partner recipient sites in the communities where they serve.
  • Produce Prescription Program: Several farmer markets in Kentucky have implemented Produce Rx programs including Letcher County, Menifee County, and Community Farmers Market in Bowling Green. This manual presents the steps to implement a Produce Prescription Program (aka Produce Rx, PRx, or Veggie Rx) between three types of organizations or programs: 1) a nutrition education program, 2) a healthcare partner, and 3) a local farmers market. This model is based on a successful program developed by Adelante Mujeres, a Latina women’s empowerment organization, and Virginia Garcia, a Federally Qualified Health Center, both based in Washington County, OR.
  • Summer Food Service Program: Markets interested in serving as a site for summer meals should visit the Kentucky Department of Education, Division of School and Community Nutrition web site.

9. More Resources for Growing Your Market

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