Sustainability in Rhode Island

Last December, I went to the Wintertime Farmers Market located in Pawtucket, RI. This was my first time going to a farmers market, and I have to say, it was nothing like I had expected.  There were so many vendors and a lot of customers. I was especially surprised to see how a lot of them were running their business by themselves or only with a couple other people. There was no extravagant supply chain, just their farm to the market. I was able to speak with a few of the vendors, and they seemed to be very enthusiastic when talking about their products to me. I interviewed Earth Essence Herbs and Nettie's Kettle Corn.

Earth Essence Herbals

Among all the vendors selling foods or clothing items, I cam across Earth Essence Herbals. Normally I am not very interested in herbs or oils, but the little bottles all lined up on the shelves definitely caught my attention. I went over and started talking to the vendor. At first, she seemed a little quiet, but once we started talking about her business, she could not hide her enthusiasm for her work. The vendor was very proud of her herbs and claimed all of them were grown by her in her workshop. Only natural products were used in the manufacturing process and she was the only one who worked in the workshop. I could tell she had great pride in her work.

I was surprised to hear that she had founded Earth Essence Herbals by herself and she had carried the business on her own. Always having loved plants and herbs, the vendor said she had taken classes at a college to become more knowledgeable in this topic. Apart from her knowledge, she uses the internet to find what plant has what kinds of functions and incorporates this into her products. She seemed so passionate about her work, and I knew this would show in the quality of her products.

As for sustainability, most of the products were sold in glass bottles, which she insisted was purposely produced this way for the environment. Moreover, no chemicals were injected or any sort of animal testing was involved during the process of making these herbs. She was firm about her business being of high quality and environmentally friendly. I did not get a chance to try using any of her products, but I am sure of their quality since they are produced solely with natural ingredients. I admire her courage of starting and maintaining a business all by herself and following her passion.

Nettie's Kettle Corn

In order to distinguish their businesses from others, some of the vendors offered samples of their products for the customers to taste. I stopped by one vendor who was offering samples of different flavors of her kettle corn. Nettie's Kettle Corn is a business owned by a single vendor. All of its kettle corn is produced from a facility in Pawtucket, RI. The vendor does everything all by herself. She produces the kettle corn, brings them to the market, and sells them to the customers. She works alone at her facility and assured me that all of her products were grown here.

An interesting trait of Nettie's Kettle Corn is that all of their kettle corn are gluten free and nut free. I thought this was made their business stand out since gluten free and nut free products are often highly demanded. The vendor did say that their customers love their kettle corn because they come without gluten and nuts.

As I was interested in the sustainability factor of her business, I asked the vendor if there was anything she did to make her business more friendly to the environment. All of the leftover stuff that she has from making the kettle corn is sold to other farmers who use these to feed their animals. The rest is used by the vendor herself to feed her own animals as well. She said this was her way of taking an environmental stance on her business since she did not just waste any leftovers from her products. All of them went into use somehow. 

Fun Fact: The vendor visited Florida and saw kettle corn like this being sold there. She thought this was a fun idea and decided she wanted to do something like that as well. Eventually, she founded Nettie's Kettle Corn. This business, according to her, was "kind of a spontaneous accident."

I have to say that I enjoyed my experience at the Wintertime Farmers Market. Everything was really unexpected, and I was amazed as to how passionate the vendors were about their businesses. Furthermore, it seemed as though a lot of the customers were regulars at the market. I was a little surprised to see this at first. I guess a lot of people like to know where their products are coming from and who is producing them rather than just buy them from local stores. It was a lot of fun and a great new experience for me, and if I get a chance, I would like to visit other markets similar to this one in the future as well!

Ji Heon Kim

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