Business calendar

I think for the next few days on this blog I will track my introduction to the Google Calendar - how I can use it and how it can be useful for other vendors and market owners. See, one of the issues during the market season is communication between the market owners and the vendors regarding changes in schedules, booth placement changes, etc. Things that occur during the season. Vendors tend to get so busy they neglect to check all their messages or update their contact information and they end up not getting the information being sent to them. Hopefully by using things like Google calendars, Gmail, blogs and such we can create an easy system by which communication won't break down so easy and maybe even increase communication during the market season.

BTW - tools like this would also come in very handy during the off season. There is no need for the market owners to just disappear during the winter months. They should keep in contact with their vendors throughout the year - keep their interest, keep them updated, and keep them coming back the next years.

What will farmers markets look like in the future?

I created this blog because I am concerned about where the future of farmers markets is headed. They have been a great tradition in our communities and have also been used by lots of entreprenures as marketing tools or incubators not to mention the thousands of vendors who make thier livelyhood there. Today there are almost 5,000 markets across the country but many fail each year because of competition. One of the things I see is the owners of the markets are growing larger and keeping others from opening. There are lots of reasons a market can fail but this is a big one. What I do not want to see is that 10 years from now farmers markets becoming just another industry comprised only of large companies. I hope I can spark some interest by asking the question "what will farmers markets look like in the future?"