The Rossland Mountain Market Society needs more volunteers if there’s going to be a summer market next year.
The society held its annual general meeting after the first winter market of the year on Saturday, looking for communitymembers who could contribute to making the market happen.
“We’re looking for volunteers who can help us on the day of the farmers’ market, so sort of the day to day physical marketoperations,” said Miche Warwick, market manager. “We’re also looking for new board members, which are volunteer positionsas well. So there’s lots of different jobs that need to be done.”
Volunteers who manage market days do receive a small honorarium for their work, but the exact amount depends on vendorattendance, since that’s the market’s source of revenue, and vendor attendance can depend largely on the support the marketreceives from the community.
“Right now our market is struggling to get vendors to come to Rossland,” said Warwick. “Last year I worked really, really, reallyhard to get a lot of new vendors to come to Rossland and a lot of them haven’t returned because they didn’t have a supersuccessful experience.”
Farmers and food vendors tend to do alright at the market, but artisan vendors can have a harder time, especially during thesummer months.
“We need the community to come out. If they want to see a variety of vendors here, they’ve got to come out to support themwhen they are here,” said Warwick.
Tourists can help boost the market, and definitely show up during the winter, but the market society needs more volunteersto help draw in tourists over the summer.
“The more hands we have on deck, the stronger of an advertising team we can have,” said Warwick. “I’ve had it in my mind tohit Christina Lake as like a key advertising area because during the summer there’s so many people there, and they have areally small market that runs on Sundays. Having a Thursday market doesn’t really compete with that and it would give folksthere something to do, but we just need more people to be dedicated at a time to help us do things like that.”
Due to the closing of the Miners’ Hall for renovations, there will only be two more winter markets this year, unless the societycan find another location to hold them at. The other two markets will on Saturday, Dec. 19 and Saturday, Jan. 30 from 2 p.m.to 6 p.m.
If you’d like to volunteer with the Rossland Mountain Market Society, you can contact them atrosslandmountainmarket@gmail.com for more information.