For the past six years, Lois Vaughn and her husband, along with other open-air entrepreneurs, have been selling their fresh vegetables, fruits and other goods at a local farmer’s market located in the parking lot of two Baylor Scott & White locations.
The farmer’s market is held every Friday at the Baylor Scott & White Hospital on Rock Prairie, along with a smaller version of the market held on Tuesdays at the Baylor Scott & White Clinic on University. The market includes the sale of meat, honey, eggs, vegetables, fruits and more.
Having two markets in two residential areas is ideal for the their customers, according to Vaughn.
“They love it,” Vaughn said. “It’s convenient. We have people that come here that won’t drive all the way out to the hospital. We have people out there that won’t come drive out here. We’ve got two sets of clientele and we got a pretty good size customer base.”
Raising almost all of their food themselves, the Vaughns said they take pride in their all-organic products.
“We don’t use any commercial chemical fertilizers,” Vaughn said. “We don’t use any chemical bug sprays or weed killers or any of that pre-emergence. We don’t use any of that in the garden. None of it in the garden. It’s all organic. We’ve been married fifty-three years, and we have always farmed. We raised four children, and they didn’t know what grocery stores were.”
Another business at the market, Harvest Moon, sells specialty jams, eggs and breads. Jennifer Gibbs, the businesses owner, started her business from a hobby sixteen years ago. Knowing about her interest in baking and cooking, Gibbs’ father asked to make a jam from some dewberries he picked from his land.
After researching recipes from a book on canning, Gibbs made her first dewberry jam. From there, Gibbs began to experiment with different flavors, gave them away as gifts and eventually began to sell them at her previous job. Her co-workers told her to turn her jams into a business.
“They told me at work, ‘You need to sell these. I mean really sell these,’” Gibbs said. “I quit my job, and I’ve been doing this full time for four years.”
Diane Wells is a frequent customer at the market and has been shopping at the Harvest Moon booth for over two years. Wells said she especially likes the jams.
“They’re just delicious and like the blueberry blast, you’ll see chunks of blueberries in there,” Wells said. “A lot of the jams will have chunks of things, it’s not just like a jelly. Full of fruit.”
According to Gibbs, the local feel of the market is what makes it so appealing to her customers.
“A lot of people like the idea of a small business owner trying to make it,” Gibbs said. “It’s local. They’re kind of hard to find, but when you find them — it’s the thrill of finding a local artisan that’s not commercialized.”
She said she is okay with her small establishment. Gibbs said she has no plans to expand to a bakery or small store, especially because her customers appreciate the experience of visiting the market.
“My customers enjoy doing that, versus going into one of these stores here, and the shopping centers, and bakeries or whatever,” Gibbs said. “You can tell a lot of difference with the customer service that you get. When you come here, it’s kind of like going to see your friend.”