Starting October 26th, youth visitors to the Montavilla Farmers Market can sample a seasonal food item selected from market vendors. Participants aged two to 12 will receive $3 vouchers to spend at a farmer’s booth after sampling the food. For the last decade, this program, highlighting the “Power of Produce”(POP), has run through the market’s winter season. With grant funding from the East Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District (EMSWCD), the Kids’ POP Club not only helps young people expand their tastes for fresh, local vegetables but also supports market vendors during the quieter winter months.
Volunteer staff prepare the day’s selected food item on a portable camping stove, sometimes with light seasoning of salt and an organic oil. They then greet kids of all ages, offering samples of the local vegetables available at the market to willing children and their accompanying adults. As a reward for trying the item, appropriately aged tasters receive $3 in “POP Bucks” to spend at a vendor’s booth. Program leaders select the item, working with vendors to highlight foods that they have in significant quantities. Although the $3 voucher applies to a wide variety of items, many people spend it on the produce of the week, provided the child likes it. “We’ll still give them the POP Bucks even if they smell it. They don’t have to like it; they can spit it out. The reward is for just trying it, not liking it,” explained Market Manager Anina Estrem.
The POP Club idea originated in the State with the Oregon City Farmers Market in 2011, and by 2015, the Montavilla Farmers Market had replicated the program at its location. The activities run through the winter market season, this year occurring weekly from November through December 21st and then from January to April 26th every other Sunday. Scheduling the program in a slower season is strategic for the year-round operation. “I think POP Club is often the big reason that people come to the market. Kids say, ‘I want to go get my money.’ Almost every week this summer, a kid would stop by asking when the pop club was going to start. We run it specifically in the Winter to get people out, because otherwise it’d be really easy to stay home and warm and dry. We do have an incredible abundance of produce [in the Winter]. So there is stuff once you get people there,” explained Estrem.
The POP club and the summertime activity Vegucation Station help people expand their ideas about what healthy foods they can adopt into their diet; however, they also contribute to environmental well-being, which is a primary reason EMSWCD funds those programs with grants. “At the Conservation District, our mission is a healthy flow of water, helping people take care of land and water. Farmers are on the front lines of that work, and support for the farmers market is support for farmers,” said Heather Nelson Kent with EMSWCD. “Money goes to the people buying the produce, but the farmers are beneficiaries. At Montavilla’s market, we have a lot of farmers who are using really good farming practices such as low or no use of chemicals, water saving irrigation systems, low till and cover cropping.”
For the people and organizations participating in the POP Club, it is a winning program on all fronts. Farmers with good growing practices receive support during slower seasons, and children discover food options that often do not occur to them when it comes to their eating habits. “Yeah, we try to pick vegetables that are a little unfamiliar, so that’s why we stay away from fruit. Most kids aren’t gonna have a problem trying an apple or a pear, but we had purple cauliflower this week. There were definitely some kids who thought that was weird. A couple of kids who just didn’t like cauliflower and didn’t want to try it,” recalled Estrem. “There’s always a pretty good mix of kids that are really eager to try stuff, and then we usually have maybe a fifth of them that will never try. Last year, we had bok choy, black radish, turnips, and fennel. Things that aren’t necessarily considered kids’ foods, but we often get feedback from the vendors on that day that they had better sales of the vegetable that we taste tested.”
People wishing to have their children participate can stop by the Kids POP Club booth in the Montavilla Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sundays or every other Sunday from January through April. The market is currently located on SE Stark Street east of SE 76th Avenue. They are still seeking volunteers to assist with running the booth, and EMSWCD’s community grant program is open for applications until December 17th.
