The Winchester Farmers Market Community Hub explores the different aspects of community building and the ways that bring people together. With the Winchester Farmers Market as the starting point various programs are developed that contribute to a more resilient vibrant community.
- Provide a venue for the residents of Winchester and surrounding towns to help foster a sense of community
- Provide a venue to support healthy, locally grown and produced food.
- Promote various aspects of sustainable and resilient community.
- Partner with local organizations to promote local music and the arts, health, environment, justice, local economy, and recreation.
- Support the vulnerable local community.
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Winchester Farmers Market - The outdoor farmers market begins the second Saturday of June and ends the last Saturday of October and is held on the Winchester Town Common. The indoor market is held at the Jenks Center, the Saturday before Thanksgiving. The market serves as a vibrant community gathering place that enriches the social, civic, and economic fabric of the Town of Winchester and the surrounding region.
In addition to promoting the production and consumption of locally grown, healthy fruits, vegetables and meats, the Market provides an opportunity for local entrepreneurs. It is also a venue to promote the local arts and music community, non profits and host special events like the Organizations Fair and International Day. Offsite events have included garden and farm tours and a climate change adaptation symposium.
Small Business Incubator - After sixteen years of operating the farmers market, we've witnessed many startup businesses pass through with various experiences of success. WFMCHub is developing a program, with the assistance of many of our vendors, that gives support for the many aspects that helps a business succeed. They range from finances to marketing to staffing.
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Food Security programs - Includes Anna's Fund which supplements the food budget for fresh, healthy produce for those in need of food assistance.
Produce donation. At the end of each market day produce donated the market farmers and vendors are distributed to the Dwelling Place and Anchor Baptist Soup Kitchens.
The North of Boston Food Pantry was created as a support network for local food pantries. There are currently a dozen pantries representing eight local towns.
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Gardens for Good - G4G is a network of landowners converting lawns into food gardens. The food grown is donated to the Council of Social Concern and the En Ka Food Pantry. Volunteer gardeners help the landowners using ecologically beneficial organic and regenerative gardening methods.
People learn how to garden as well as other aspects of a food system like how to safely and efficiently process and distribute the harvested products.
- Grow Local for the Planet - Grow Local ecological restoration and regenerative gardening practices about the interconnected and interdependence of the natural systems of the earth starting with the microbiome in the soil. Those practices improve both our ecological environment and interactions between our environment and our health
- Farmers Market - social media content; event coordinator; journalist, story writer, setting up market, assistant market administrator
- Food Security - SNAP processors; donated food collectors and distributors; fundraiser
- Gardens for Good program - residents interested in learning about gardening practices; fruit & vegetable gardeners interested in regenerative gardening; landowners interested in turning lawns into food production; support personnel for processing and distribution to food pantries
- Grow Local for the Planet - pollinator gardeners