Expect some madcap activity in Madrona this summer as the Madison/Capitol Hill (Mad Cap) Farmers Market opens on Friday, May 4, in the Grocery Outlet parking lot.
About 25 to 30 vendors are expected to sell their produce and other food items and crafts from 3 to 7 p.m. when the market opens on the southeast corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Way and East Union Street. And the number of vendors is expected to grow to capacity with more than 40 as the season progresses, according to market manager Judy Kirkhuff.
The market will end its season Sept. 28.
INEVITABLE MOVE
The Map Cap market was previously in the parking lot of Mount Zion Baptist Church, at East Madison Street and 20th Avenue East, under an open-ended agreement.
However, market organizers - which include Jon Hegeman, founder of the Fremont Sunday Market - chose to move the market to Madrona after two years because the Grocery Outlet owners "offered "significant help...[with] storage and amenities that we really couldn't get from Mount Zion," Kirkhuff explained.
She said the store approached them, offering to handle the market's advertising through its own regular flier mailings, hang the market's banners all week long and operate with a "simple working agreement."
At the previous location, the market had to dismantle its signs during the week and paid rent, she elaborated. She also estimates that this site is 30 percent larger than the last.
"We didn't anticipate [moving] so soon," Kirkhuff said. "[But] we knew from the beginning we would move."
Grocery Outlet co-owner Steve Mullen said, "It was the right thing, offering this space to the farmers market because it's what the community would like to see.... It's just going to generate more traffic through the area. All things will be better because of it."
LOCAL CUSTOMERS
Kirkhuff anticipates many of the market's customers to be pedestrian traffic from the surrounding neighborhoods: "Buses are nearby, and it's easier to walk to [than the previous site]," she said.
For those farther away, parking is available in the remainder of the store parking lot and along the streets.
And, depending on its draw, the market could expand to a year-round one, Kirkhuff said. Market organizers will review Mad Cap market's demand at the end of the year.
[[In-content Ad]]
