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Walmart will be hosting a “Fresh Farmer’s Market” Saturday at the site of their proposed store in Chatham, at 83rd and Stewart. Press releases were sent to local news outlets, and the Tribune’s story on the market remained on their site’s front page all day yesterday. Could it be true? Could Walmart actually be getting involved with the community and promoting products grown here, rather than in China or Mexico? Or is this just another shot in the ongoing battle between Walmart and the City Council? (Ed. Note: A Sun-Times op-ed today weighs in favor of a Walmart in Chatham. — CS)
It’s true that some of the produce will be locally grown. Tara Stewart, Walmart’s regional director of media relations, was kind enough to give us a list of many of the growers involved in this project, and indeed, most of them are located in the tri-state area. However, when their press materials bragged about Walmart’s “signature low prices,” we became a bit suspicious. Is this a Farmer’s Market as we know it, or is it a produce stand run by the world’s largest retailer? “All the produce is sourced, delivered, and sold by Walmart,” Stewart confirmed. Does this matter, if the products are “sourced” from the Midwest?
Well, yes, at least if you’re the City of Chicago. Few of the growers listed would qualify to participate in an official Chicago Farmer’s Market. For example, Westcott Orchards (or “Westcott Agri Products”) boasts about their “strategic relationships with quality growers and processors around the globe” and informs potential buyers that they “source 'new crop' fruit products from as far away as New Zealand, Chile, South Africa and Australia to ensure our customers have fresh fruit on a year round basis.” While they also have an orchard in Minnesota, this is hardly a small, local farm. Similarly, Bushman’s Potatoes offers “year-round potato and onion availability” and ships from their “vast acres across the U.S,” including sites in California, Florida and yes, Michigan and Wisconsin. They include a link to Dole on their website. And forget about organic certification.
The City of Chicago farmer’s market guidelines specify that growers must grow 100% of the products they sell - no reselling or distribution. Small, individual farms are given preference even over moderately sized co-ops, and when was the last time you saw a Dole Pineapple at a Chicago farmer’s market?
Given the dearth of grocery retailers on the south side, we support any effort to bring fresh produce into the area, especially at prices people can afford. Walmart is donating all the proceeds of the market to the Chatham Business Assocation, which is also admirable. We would love to see Walmart include a significant amount of locally produced food in any future stores. But calling this a "Farmer’s Market” is obfuscation of the worst kind. Farmer’s markets are meant to bring fresh, local products into the city, improving health and nutrition while creating business for local companies and providing a living to local families. There are a small but growing number of actual farmer’s markets opening in underserved areas. We worry that any entry by Walmart into this arena may actually hurt these efforts.
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That's really lame. They might as well have just taken the produce section from inside the store, moved it outside and slapped a "Farmers Market" sign on it. I hate when massive multinational businesses try to act all Mom and Pop.
By using produce from their vendors, that's what Walmart's doing. Anthony was pretty clear that, while it's nice that Chatham residents will be able to buy fresh produce without having travel out of the neighborhood if only for a day (see Mari Gallagher's recent study on the progress of eradicating food deserts in Chicago for a specific case regarding the closing of a Chatham-based supermarket), Walmart's actions aren't entirely altruistic.
They've been working with Alderman Howard Brookins to bring a Walmart to Chatham for years and you can believe that the revenue and traffic this market will generate will be used as evidence to support that. Why Brookins wouldn't target Albertson's about opening a Jewel, Safeway about opening a Dominick's, or if he did and was rebuffed by both, only he knows. What Brookins does know is that Walmart is stepping up to the plate for his ward and it would be politically damaging if he didn't at least listen to their overtures.
I wish Howard Brookins would put some of that political muscle behind bringing real jobs to the community. Fighting for living-wage manufacturing jobs and better access to apprenticeships in the building trades would have a much more significant multiplier effect on the community than opening a giant store (Wal-Mart or otherwise). It's about putting dollars into the community, not shoveling out the door.
Manufacturing jobs? You're kidding right?
This reminds of a video from a few years back ...
sendables.jibjab.com/originals/big_box_mart
I agree with Slaphappy. Impossibly lame.
There will be an actual local farmers market at the Whole Foods Market South Loop store on Roosevelt and Canal St. in August and continuing through the fall, FYI. It's not quite the south side, but the farmers will be there, and they won't have pineapples.
I spent most of my youth watching Wal-mart move through small communities in the south and annihilate any kind of locally-based economy, so I'm as anti-Wal-mart as the next guy. But still, I have to ask the Chicagoist readership at large: Why would Albertson's or Safeway be any better for a community than Wal-mart? All three organizations are corporations based somewhere else, and any jobs any of them would bring would pay approximately the same rate. There doesn't seem to be much difference. Is there?
You're correct, there is little or no difference. Wal-Mart being singled out as the chief evil-doer is a giant distraction from the real issue. The only solution is to start buying from actual local farmers. http://localharvest.org and get to it.
No thanks, I like pineapple.
"The only solution is to start buying from actual local farmers."
I agree, though I'm fortunate to live in a neighborhood with its own, fairly decent weekly farmers market. I wonder how people in Chatham could accomplish this. And what's to keep local farmers from starting their own farmers market in the area?
I've been reading about this for a little while now. I have to say, it's Wal-Mart--big surprise.
But if this statement below is true, the real scandal is the neighborhood markets that are clearly not abiding by these guidelines.
"The City of Chicago farmer’s market guidelines specify that growers must grow 100% of the products they sell - no reselling or distribution. Small, individual farms are given preference even over moderately sized co-ops, and when was the last time you saw a Dole Pineapple at a Chicago farmer’s market?"
It's funny that pineapples are being tossed around in this discussion because pineapples, in their boxes, were the first thing I saw at a particular farmer's market that I was excited about (at first). I don't like to assume that their hearts are in the wrong place but I don't feel like it's my place to "educate" them.
It's crappy from a foodie (and socially conscious) point of view, I guess, but as much as I hate the concept of Wal-Mart... jobs + food other than Flaming Hot Cheetos is some kind of progress. I won't hold it against Starbucks that they're fudging their "farmer's market" credentials until a REAL farmer's market comes into the neighborhood and provides some competition.
God, did I write Starbucks? Man, gotta get my "corporate devils" straight.
I, of course, meant Wal-Mart.
A couple things: First, Walmart gets singled out because they are the largest single employer in the United States and they have consistently reprehensible hiring policies (namely, low wages, no benefits, keeping employees working 39 hours a week classified as 'part-time' and not eligible for any kind of benefits or security). The fact that they are so large makes their policies proportionally more harmful than other large, impersonal corporations.
Second, re: the pineapple issue. Pineapples grown locally (i.e., in a hothouse) are okay; that kind of production just does not work on a large scale. Also, sometimes what is better for the community and the world at large is more important than one's desire for pineapple in mid-winter.
Last, thank you, once again, Anthony for bringing these issues of local production to the attention of those of us (busy students with heads in books!) who might not otherwise notice. 'Local' foods are trendy right now, but there are plenty of other issues that need to be addressed in food production in this country, and meeting the trend should not be the enemy of doing the right thing.
I should have simply stated that if you go to a farmer's market in a Wal-Mart parking lot or in your Chicago neighborhood and say this,
"do you think they just went to Wal-Mart and bought cases of fruit to sell?"
then it is not a farmer's market.
"Why would Albertson's or Safeway be any better for a community than Wal-mart? There doesn't seem to be much difference. Is there?"
There's a huge difference in that Wal-Mart does not allow its workers to organize, while organized workers at Albertsons, Safeway or Jewel can bargain for better wages, benefits, conditions, etc.
more:
http://www.slate.com/id/2113954/
http://wakeupwalmart.com/facts/
Give me a break. That empty lot has sat in the South Side community since 2004 and not ONE single retailer has come to build a store, even after the state of Illinois offers financial incentives to do so! It's not like Brookins hasn't been trying. Still, the North Side has all the fresh fruit and veggies it needs and yet City Council turns its nose up at $12 an hour wages because they are "Walmart wages."
Only in Chicago are no jobs, better than non union jobs.
Check out this Washington Post story which debunks many of the Walmart healthcare myths:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/12/AR2009021204096_pf.html
True.
You can buy 4 bedroom homes in Chatham for less than $70k. I think $12/hour with ok benefits is a good start.