The Best Time To Shop At Your Local Farmer's Market

Are you tired of huge, impersonal supermarkets, with their harsh fluorescent lighting and refusal to stop playing that one Lewis Capaldi song? Are you looking for a cozier, more intimate shopping experience? Well, keep an eye on your local event calendar, and you might just find yourself a farmers' market. There, you can browse any number of stalls brimming with wares, including fresh fruits and vegetables, choice cuts of meat, homemade baked goods, and honey. (There's always somebody selling honey at a farmers' market.) The question, then, is what time you want to go: Closer to the start of the day, or closer to the end? We asked Andrea Woroch, a nationally recognized expert in consumer finance and savings, and she said that both have their pros and cons.

"Shopping at your local farmers' market during [the start of] operating hours ensures a bigger selection of fresh food," Woroch said, which makes intuitive sense. If you arrive before everyone else, you get to have your pick of watermelon (which you can pick with just your eyes), tomato (here's how to slice one like a professional), or whatever fruit or veggie your heart desires. Unfortunately for you, however, you're almost certainly not the only person with that idea: "[Y]ou will have to deal with bigger crowds and longer lines," Woroch added.

But what's the alternative, really? Going at the end of the day, when all the good stuff is sold out? Well, it may not be quite so clear-cut as that. Andrea Woroch said that, while "they may be sold out of some fruits or vegetables or other fresh foods that were popular," going to the farmers' market at the end of the day is a sound strategy for landing good deals. "[S]ellers will be eager to sell off remaining foods at a discount and will be more willing to give you a discount or offer freebies," she explained.

After all, nobody wants to lug several pounds of unsold cantaloupe, however ripe and sweet, back to their truck. Vendors at farmers' markets want to sell as much product as possible, and if you happen to be around at the end of the day, they'll be willing to haggle a bit if it means they get some return on their crops. Haggling, or bargaining, is a muscle many of us haven't exercised in quite some time — you can't really haggle with a barcode, after all — but maybe it's good to get your practice in.