Feb 24, 2012

‘Location’ adage proves true for Michigan farm market

Rich Barden used to have a farmstand behind a car dealer/garage on a very busy corner in South Haven, Mich. The original stand was built at Barden’s farm and hauled down to the corner on the back of a truck in 1995. The location has proven to be a good one. When the owner of the car dealership recently decided to call it a career, Barden knew the opportunity to move into the garage space was too good to pass up.

The 2011 Great Lakes Fruit, Vegetable & Farm Market EXPO bus tour paid a visit to Barden’s Farm Market in December to see what its owner sees all the time: A great location.

“We’re right off a busy highway and on the corner of two very busy roads,” Barden said. “There is just a ton of summer traffic through here as this is a major tourism spot, especially being a relatively short drive from Chicago.”

The building was closed at the time of the tour, but it was clear it was well suited to being a farm market.

“We knew we had to jump on it when the garage closed,” Barden said. “We had to do a lot of renovations over the last winter to get it where we wanted it, but it is working out well.”

Barden kept the large, rolling doors of the garage and uses them to make the market open up during warm months. Large tents, a carryover from the stand days, help keep everyone dry during rainy days – but still feeling like they’re in an open-air market, he said.

Location No. 2

The success of the first location pushed Barden to open a second market.

“We opened a market north of Holland in 2002,” he said. “Then, we had the opportunity to move it to a better location near Saugatuck in 2003, which is the current location.”

The second location is also just off a major expressway, in a parking lot where Barden uses tents. All the produce is trucked up daily.

“We stay in touch with the team running the second market,” he said. “It is a tough call, but if it looks like sales are really hopping up there and they are running low, we will send another truck up. It’s a long drive and a lot of expense, but it can be worth it.”

Most of the produce sold at the market comes from Barden’s family farm in southwest Michigan, which he and his wife Laura took over in 1986.

The newly remodeled corner market has the benefit of refrigerated coolers to help keep some of the products and produce available for longer periods.

“Refrigeration is definitely a consideration,” he said. “When we send produce up to the second location, it goes in coolers. What doesn’t get sold gets dumped in the compost bins. We’ve been lucky that the other location is good, too, as we’ll sell most of what we take up.”

In addition to fruits, vegetables and baked goods, Barden’s markets offer jams, jellies, sauces and dressings. Barden also offers a full array of greenhouse plants and flowers, as well as hanging baskets and other ornamentals.

When Barden looked into adding an on-site, USDA-approved kitchen at the original farm market, the advice he got was to build it bigger.

“We built the kitchen twice as big as we thought we’d need it, and it has already proved to us that it isn’t nearly as big as we actually need it to be,” Barden said. “We’re already looking at expanding the kitchen. We have to.”

By Derrek Sigler, Assistant Editor