The St. Norbert Farmers’ Market (SNFM) has long established itself as one of the busiest and most anticipated outdoor markets in Manitoba. The market, located on South Pembina in Winnipeg, has been around for 31 years and operates as a non-profit co-op, providing Manitobans with fresh, locally grown and handmade products.
Beginning on May 18 and continuing every Saturday until mid-October, residents of the southeast will once again find all their favourite farmers selling locally grown vegetables, fruits, and pastured meats. As well, they can pick up home-baking and prepared foods and browse through a broad range of handicrafts and home décor items.
From June 5 until mid-September, the market will extend to include Wednesday hours.
“The most important thing to know about our market is that everything here is made, baked, or grown by the vendor,” says Marilyn Firth, Executive Director of the SNFM board. “And it’s completely local… When you’re coming here, you’re not only supporting local Manitobans but you’re seeing the skills that Manitobans have and the things that they’re doing on a really ground level.”
The mandate of the SNFM board has always been to provide local producers with a location to kickstart their business or grow their existing one. Firth says that it’s proven successful, as many of the local small-scale farmers have watched their operations continually grow since the market began in the late 1980s.
Each vendor applicant goes through a vetting process to ensure that they fall under the guidelines set out by the board and will complement the existing vendors there.
“We inspect all of our vendors,” says Firth. “We’ll go out to their farms or their businesses and make sure that they’re making, baking, and growing their own.”
The market provides some part-time student employment each summer and volunteer help comes to them from the Behavioural Health Foundation of Winnipeg, a rehabilitation and treatment centre located near the SNFM grounds.
Firth began working with the seven-member SNFM board 12 years ago and is herself a small-scale farmer along with her husband Bruce. Together they operate Almost Urban, an 11-acre non-certified organic vegetable farm located just one kilometre west of the SNFM site.
Prior to that, the Firths gave up their careers in southern Ontario—she was a television director, he was an engineer. They were looking for a different kind of lifestyle. Packing up their three boys, they ventured around the country for six months, living out of a tent trailer while they toured and volunteered on organic farms. This provided the hands-on skillset they needed to complement Firth’s recently acquired horticultural degree and permaculture training.
“We met some great people and we got some ideas about what we wanted to do,” Firth says. “We were searching for that change. We wanted to do something that felt really valuable and worthwhile.”
The couple finally settled in Winnipeg, finding the ideal location for their dream business. Their sons have since grown and moved on, and since the farm continues to grow they’ve had to hire three full-time staff to help out.
Firth doesn’t remember the SNFM’s beginnings but is told that it began with eight local vendors selling wares on a plot of grass at the very location it sits on today. By the time she joined the board, they had already reached 80 vendors.
“The nice thing about the market is that it’s kind of grown in this slow organic way,” Firth says. “The founder of the market… always says that if the first year had been a rainy year there probably would never have been a market here, but it was a beautiful sunny year and people just started to come. It just sort of grew and grew until now, in the summer months, we’ll have 125 vendors on site on a Saturday.”
Over the years, the slow and steady growth has allowed the board to continue developing the property in thoughtful and intentional ways.
Last year, the board removed three open-air canopies and replaced them with a huge semi-permanent structure measuring 130 feet long, 90 feet wide, and 31 feet high. The new structure provides shelter for 63 vendors inside while the rest are located on the grounds around it. Because it’s a four-season facility, it also provides the perfect on-site space for their indoor winter market, previously held at a nearby club.
The success of the SNFM is due to a number of factors, Firth says. Firstly, it was born during a time when small-scale farming was just making a comeback in popularity following a long dry spell. The market was one of the first in the city, established by farmers as a way to market their products.
Location, she adds, is also key.
“Being on the edge of the city like this, you’re a little bit country and a little bit city and that adds to the vibe of a farmers’ market in a way that is fairly unique.”
The vastness of the site has also accommodated the inclusion of farm-related activities and entertainers for the families that come. While the city now boasts a host of farmers’ markets throughout its many neighbourhoods, many of them are bound by space that prevents the same kind of growth.
Annual Events
More than just a farmers’ market, the board is excited to reintroduce a number of annual events that make a comeback year after year.
A Canada Day celebration will be hosted on July 1 from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Families will find the usual market vendors along with a variety of entertainers and kids activities. Fireworks will follow, provided by the SNFM board in collaboration with the St. Norbert Biz.
On August 7, the Farmers Festival will return for the fifth year running. The theme? “Home Skills for the Twenty-First Century.”
“We get all our vendors who have all of these amazing skills… and we have all these different demo booths set up,” Firth says.
Last year’s event showcased demos in yogurt making, food fermentation, knitting, pasta making, rocket stove construction, beeswax candle-dipping, among other things.
Tickets will soon be available for the eleventh annual Farmers Feast, held on September 5 this year. The structure’s interior will be beautifully lit and decorated to host those interested in experiencing a home-grown fine dining experience.
“We do a fancy dinner in here… and it’s all local food,” says Firth. “For each course, the chef tells about what he made and then the farmer whose food is in the dishes gets up and talks a little about their farm and their experiences growing in Manitoba… To me, this is the best connection that you can make with your local producers.”
Towards the Christmas season, holiday markets will be held every Saturday in December up until the holidays. A variety of choral groups and a festive atmosphere lend well to these special market events.
Throughout the changing seasons, the produce markets never stop. Winter storage vegetables were available at the SNFM throughout the winter this past year. The introduction of the new structure means that many local farmers can produce more since their selling period has stretched well beyond the growing season.
Parking is available year-round at the rear of the market on property owned by the St. Norbert Foundation, a charitable organization that provides rental space for community events. The two-dollar parking fee collects funds for a variety of projects that benefit the St. Norbert community. The summer Saturday markets will be open from 8:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. The Wednesday markets run from 11:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m.
