Before Shawn Aloisio loaded up his strawberry plants and live herbs to sell at the All Vendors Market Place in downtown Prince George on Saturday, he first had to scrape the frost off the windshield of his car.
Fortunately, those tender plants and the leafy vegetables he harvested to sell at the market didn’t freeze in their long rows, planted at Little Leaf Farms in the Chief Lake area northwest of the city, and the unseasonable mid-June chill did not do any damage.
Aloisio was enjoying the comfort of having four walls and roof over him, protected from the elements of weather as he sat at his stall in the city’s newest marketplace - a 6,400-square-foot building big enough to host 108 vendors on one floor. He grows lettuce, arugula, Swiss chard and other microgreens year-round in the greenhouses of his farm and it will be a luxury for him to sell his produce all year in a heated building without having to duck for cover from the rain, wind or snow.
All Vendors Market Place opened a month ago and unlike farmers markets it does not restrict vendors from having to make, bake or grow what they sell. COVID-19 precautions mean the market can operate only at half-capacity (56 vendors) and every weekend it’s been getting increasingly busy. Open Saturday from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. and Sundays from 10:30 a.m-2:30 p.m., it started with nine vendors on opening weekend, doubled the following week, and they’ve had 27 vendors the past two weeks.
“Business has been consistent, it hasn’t been swamped yet but as we get more vendors, more vendors bring more people and it will snowball,” said Aloisio.
“I think in the long run this will be the biggest winter market in town because they aren’t just a farmers’ market, it’s a vendors market which will allow anything in here. At the other (indoor market), there was always space constraints. There were limited vendors that were allowed to come in and obviously seniority has to be honoured in the system, so newer vendors in town were unable to get a really good foothold in it.”
Ginette Benoit made the trek from Mackenzie to sell four types of bread and cinnamon buns. She’s been selling her baked goods at farmers markets for decades and the money it brings is even more important to her now that her husband and 252 other workers are losing their jobs with the closure this summer of Canfor’s Paper Excellence pulp mill in Mackenzie. She booked her stall at All Vendors two weeks ago.
“It’s inside, which is awesome,” said Benoit. “I don’t have to pack a tent or buy extra things, as we do when we have a table outside. I don’t know if the market in Mackenzie will go (as a result of the pending layoffs). We were supposed to start next week but I don’t know how it will be received. My husband is 67 and he might be retiring. I’ve got tons of work for him at our house. He helps pack everything (she sells at the market) and puts my buns and bread in bags.”
The building, at 1533 Second Ave., is owned by Elaine Campbell and her business partner Peter Wise and is the former site of a gym. There’s also a 7,000 sq.foot second floor which they plan to open to crafters during the busy Christmas season and as banquet space for weddings. There’s plenty of free weekend parking available. An adjacent parking lot will be sectioned off to allow more Food Safe-certified vendors to set up barbecues and other food services once the weather heats up.
Campbell also owns the U Stor storage facility in the Hart Highway area and she and her husband Peter, who died of stroke seven months ago, came up with the idea to open the market.
“We’re trying to fill a gap that was here for years,” said Campbell. “Everybody’s welcome. Our main thrust is to get everybody happy. We’ve talked to everybody here about being friends with each other, no backstabbing or gossip, and we’re trying to set that example for them.
“I don’t think it would hurt to have another market and I’m not afraid of competition because your service is what you’re selling and we want to give the best service in town.”
COVID-19 safety is a priority and vendor tables have to be covered with two layers of cloth or plastic. All vendors are briefed on the need for sanitizing and hand-washing. The market is monitored constantly by security staff during the week and vendors can leave goods they plan to sell the following weekend at the site.
Andrea Sanzana came all the way from Vernon to sell her imported lamps, leather goods, shoes and jewelry boxes imported from Morocco and Turkey. She usually sells them at outdoor markets in the Okanagan but those are now limited to fresh food only due to limit crowding and the threat of spreading the virus.
“They don’t allow you into farmer markets and the big one I go to in Penticton, they shut down the community market for the whole summer,” said Sanzana. “Most of the markets are shut down in the Okanagan. We’ll go where we can to sell our stuff.”
