The Park City Farmers Market is still open.
The outdoor grocery shopping experience will remain open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. every Wednesday at Park City Mountain’s First Time lot as long as farmers have producers to sell, said Volker Ritzinger, who founded the market 24 years ago.
“I let the farmers decide when it should close,” he said. “When they will tell me they might be frozen out and won’t have anything to sell, then I’ll close. But until then we’ll be open.”
Park City Farmers Market is one of the very few in Utah that doesn’t have a firm closing date, according to Ritzinger, who helps other markets across the state.
“Sometimes that’s hard to explain to people how we do it,” he said. “I’ll tell them we might be open the second or third week of October, or maybe the fourth. But we need to go week by week because the farmers may have two more weeks or more of produce to sell. And I don’t want to hurt their income.”
Ritzinger will adhere to farmers’ wishes even if the temperature takes a dramatic dive.
“I’ll bring out some barrels and make fires to keep people warm,” he said with a laugh.
The longest the Park City Farmers Market has ever been open is the last week of October a few years ago, according to Ritzinger.
“It was right by Halloween, and we had snow,” he said with another laugh. “But it was a mild beginning of the winter, and the farmers still had apples and stuff. So I said, ‘Yes. We’ll do it.’”
To do that, Ritzinger makes sure his permit from Park City runs through the first week of November.
“It’s a different approach from other farmers markets,” he said.
Ritzinger also takes a different road when Park City Farmers Market providers sell out of their stock on any given Wednesday.
“I let them leave when they are done,” he said. “Some farmers markets don’t allow that, and require their farmers to stay the whole day, even if they don’t have anything else to sell.”
Treating farmers with respect is one of Ritzinger’s mantras, which can be found in Utah’s official farmers market guide.
“It says, ‘Treat your farmers like gold’ because without them we don’t have a farmers market,” he said. “You can’t be stingy, and if they make mistakes forgive them and explain what happened. Just don’t shut the doors on them.”
Ritzinger also opens the Park City Farmers Market one to two weeks earlier than others.
“I usually start the last week in May,” he said. “I do that for the guys who sell hummus, cheese and bread, and for those guys who sell honey and jams,” he said. “They always have stuff, and I want to give them the opportunity to make money when the warm sun is out.”
As the summer continues, Ritzinger sees more produce show up.
“By mid-June it’s fantastic,” he said. “The lettuces, radishes and stuff just blossoms.”
Ritzinger also allows entrepreneurs to join his market.
“I’ll sit with them to tell them what we do, and then give them a shot,” he said. “I want people to make money. That’s my goal.”
Ritzinger knows making money can be vital for some of the community’s marginalized population.
“I give veterans a place for free to sell things so they can make money, and some of my vendors are fighting cancer,” he said. “So they can also set up for free to make some money. We need to help them so they don’t sink.”
Ritzinger is grateful to Vail Resorts and Park City Mountain who have worked with him throughout the years.
“They have been really good to us in making sure we have a space for this,” he said. “For a long time we were at Canyons Cabriolet lot, but they are doing construction there. So, they let us come to First Time lot because they also see how important the market is to the community.”
Ritzinger sees the Farmers Market as a way to give back.
“Park City is a great place to live and we don’t want to lose sight of that,” he said. “This is my baby, and I love doing this. I will do this until my last breath, and I hope that doesn’t come too soon.”
Park City Farmers Market
- When: 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Wednesdays
- Where: Park City Mountain’s First Time lot
- Cost: Free
- Web: parkcityfarmersmarket.com