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"There are way too many farmers markets in Chicago"

The city of Chicago keeps adding farmers markets, but many farmers say nobody bothered to ask them whether that’s a good idea.

Starting a farmers market has stopped being a good idea in broad swaths of the city, with market managers and farmers saying the city now is oversaturated with farm-fresh produce.

Farmers said they're stretched to the limit and won’t, or can't, add another market to their schedule, lacking not only the manpower but the product.

“They’re creating more markets, but they're not creating more of us,” said Crystal Nells of Indiana's C&D Farms. “Last time I checked, there's only seven days a week. We can only be so many places at one time.”

A trend toward many smaller markets spread across neighborhoods rather than large centralized markets is making the entire farmers market system in the city unworkable for them, farmers said.

"It used to be there was the Tuesday market, and that's all there was, and everybody came," said Nells. "You'd go to a market and make a lot of money. Now you've got to be at a lot of markets to make the same amount."

Read more at DNAinfo
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