Kentucky Double Dollars - Thanks to Community Farm Alliance
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Kentucky Double Dollars is a program that provides money to double the buying power of WIC, SNAP, and Senior Voucher customers at our Farmers Market. Community Farm Alliance is the organization that secures these doubling funds and passes them to Markets like ours. We must match their grant with 25% to qualify for the program. For example, if they give us $1,500, our Market must come up with another $500 to bring our Double Dollars budget up to $2,000. In 2016 and 2017, the entire match was donated by individuals who like to support our Farmers Market customers and vendors.
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To whom it may concern;
This past year one local farmers market was a double blessing. First, the ease and availability and local fruits and vegetables, homemade breads, and fresh cut flowers (just a few examples) made each week healthy, yummy, and pleasurable. It’s important to mention how helpful SNAP’s Double Dollars program is. To go with 10 dollars and be able to spend 20 on fruits and vegetables – it was like Christmas. More important was the social aspect. I’m new to Kentucky, new to small town life and southern culture. Making friends and meeting similar souled folks was a challenge. But Burkesville’s Farmers market changed that. I’ve made several amazing friends and am now a part of a community. Next year I hope to be a vendor as well as a happy patron. Best, Karen Larsson 11/9/17 |
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The addition of Meat, Eggs and Dairy in the SNAP doubling offer meant a lot to me (Market Coordinator, Kay Williams) and to our customers. To fulfill this requirement, we used FMPP grant money to buy a chest freezer and a chest-type glass-top fridge, assembling them to sit back to back on a utility trailer. With a mobile marketing permit from the health department, we displayed eggs from Second Chance Farms, and USDA-approved frozen chicken and beef both from Kim Muer, (4C Cattle Company), an emerging artisan meat farmer.
This was Kim’s first season for producing “food, not just commodities,” as she puts it. She had been doing exclusively commodity beef since she started ranching in 2007. Kim and her son Charley launched chicken tractors, and one grass-fed beef, after attending the SSAWG Conference in 2016 and hearing Joel Salatin speak, (also provided by the FMPP grant) and loved the results |
. More than half of the 4C Cattle Company meat sold at our Farmers Market was purchased by KDD MED tokens. This created such a boost for Kim Muer, as she ventured into a new marketing challenge. She sold out, and had the perfect amount to keep the customers satisfied until the last day, which made the Double Dollars program and my job as Market Coordinator a whole lot better.
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We moved to the Burkesville area earlier this year to start a fruit and vegetable farm. Even though Bart grew up on a large produce farm and quite familiar with farmers markets, this was our first time going at it alone. We didn't know anyone and therefore didn't have an established customer base, so things started off slow. The things that really helped us grow tremendously throughout the 2017 market season were: (1) Kay Williams as the market director, and (2) the SNAP and DOUBLE DOLLARS programs. Without the SNAP and Double Dollars programs we would have lost out on a great deal of sales which effects our livelihood and the livelihood of other vendors. It also helps the eligible customers to double their buying power on fresh fruits, vegetables, poultry, and meats. It is a fantastic program that blessed our market, its farmers, and the consumer public.
Thankfully, Bart & Katina Padgett Second Chance Farms |
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We raised $500 in donations from several vendors, especially the hot-food vendor who donated the profits of several days of sales. It was very good luck to recruit this vendor, as he felt generously inclined to donate the proceeds of his hot-breakfast booth every market day to some worthy local cause, ours included.
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Frank Hill, breakfast cook, personally raised $250 for the Double Dollars program. Laural Schmidt, vendor, donated $100 and the remainder came in by dribbles, much of it from Kay selling goods at her Market Coordinator table. She purchased 10 cases of Boone's local honey at the beginning of the season, sold at a reasonable profit, reimbursed her cost as the cases sold and donated the profits to the Market. Better than interest at the bank!
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