Jefferson County’s Artisans and Growers Market is close to completing its second full year of operation. We will soon be qualified to accept SNAP cards.
The Artisans and Growers Market is sponsored by Main Street Monticello. Our primary goal is to provide a place where creative people and small growers in our area can afford to sell their products. Our strict rule is – you must MAKE IT, BAKE IT, SEW IT, or GROW IT to sell an item in this market.”
Establishing a market such as this takes a long time. We expect that to happen and are determined to stick to our goal until we succeed. We hope to build a customer base that truly appreciates things handmade and home grown. We sell a great variety of items, from t-shirts, free-range eggs to vegetables and beautiful flowering plants. Sellers offer such interesting and varied things as Mayhaw jelly, brownies and peacock feathers.
Main Street has struggled to find the perfect place to hold the market. The first few months we met in the yard of the old Jefferson County Jail on west Dogwood Street. That was tough, with no shade, no bathroom and few customers. Hal Bennett was kind enough to allow us to use his porch at Johnston’s Market last year. That was much better, we were at least on the main highway and found more customers.
This spring, the Jefferson County Historical Association offered Main Street the use of their beautiful garden behind the Wirick-Simmons house. Located at the corner of Cherry and Pearl Streets, we now erect our green tents behind their beautiful white picket fence around the garden before 9:00 AM every first Saturday.
Our next market will be Saturday August 3, 2013. We hope the weather will cooperate. If it does, we will have interesting sellers offering their products for sale. What we need now are buyers. We need you and a crowd of other interested Monticello and Jefferson County buyers to support and encourage us.

Anne