The Original Farmers' Market at City Market Will Open With New Safety Precautions

The Original Farmers’ Market at City Market in downtown Indianapolis opens Wednesday with new guidelines to keep everyone safe during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We will be cueing up guests so that we have a certain number of people in the market at any given time. We do strongly encourage customers wear face masks," says City Market Executive Director Stevi Stoesz.  "All of the vendors will have face masks."

There will also be no prepared food, demos or sampling.  Live entertainment will also be temporarily suspended from the market.

“Our market is known for being a wonderful community gathering place, but for now we must recognize that it will be a place to pick up groceries safely under new requirements,” Stoesz says. “It’s hard to know how people will respond to the new modifications that are going in place, but we hope people will come show for great local food.”

Stoesz says some vendors chose to not attend the market -- at least for a while.

“We do have some of our mature farmers market vendors who are going to abstain from coming to the farmers market for the first couple of weeks, and we’ve heard from some who are so eager from an economic impact standpoint to get out in front of customers,” Stoesz says.

Guests are encouraged to pre-pay and pre-order with individual vendors as much as possible. All vendors and their contacts can be found under the “Original Farmers’ Market” tab at http://indycm.com/

Individuals utilizing SNAP benefits will be able to once again double spending up to $20 through the Fresh Bucks program.  The program’s expansion in 2015 was made possible by a grant awarded by the Indiana State Department of Agriculture of 2014.

This is the market's 24th season.  It will be open 9:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.every Wednesday through October.