SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News) – At 2 p.m. on Tuesday, October 11, the Downtown Farmers Market in Syracuse closed the book on its 50th year of existence. Held in Clinton Square in downtown Syracuse, the Market attracted local vendors, farmers, and shoppers weekly from June 14 through Tuesday.
Like so many other social gatherings, the Market’s attendance took a large hit during the pandemic. This year, however, marked a significant uptick in turnout compared to 2021, according to Merike Treier, the executive director of the Downtown Committee of Syracuse.
“This has certainly been a little bit different than previous years, […] but definitely has been picking up since last year.”
Treier believes that this increase in attendance can be attributed to both the decrease in COVID concerns and the introduction of Community Days, a program wherein each individual market day is themed around a specific local industry, thus attracting more vendors from that line of work.
“We sent emails out, we invited different sectors to come in each week, they could enter their name into a drawing to win a gift card to a downtown business,” Treier said. “I think it helps to raise the visibility of the market throughout the year.”
Treier says upon the end of the season, the Downtown Committee of Syracuse will begin brainstorming ways to continue the upward trend in Market turnout.
“What we’ll do is we’ll kind of evaluate how the year went, and think of items we want to consider for the next year,” Treier said.
Those preliminary meetings are set to occur in December, and the Downtown Farmers Market is set to return in June of 2023.
