The Huss Project Farmers Market celebrated its sixth season this summer and it was one for the record books! Not only did market sales grow exponentially in 2025, but we also had an incredibly diverse selection of wares each Saturday thanks to our 22 participating market vendors. It is incredible to believe our market first began as an emergency response to Three Rivers closing its own market due to COVID in 2020 and to see where we are today. We are absolutely blown away seeing how it has grown and flourished.
We had more market vendors participate this summer than ever before and they showed up each Saturday with the freshest, locally-grown vegetables, eggs, baked goods, syrup, artisan dog treats, honey, herb mixes, and more. We also welcomed several new vendors for 2025, including Flowerfield Farmstead, K’s Baked Goods, Barnyard Bliss, Free Feeling, and soaps by Rachael Arrington. Several kid vendors were on site, as well, selling impressive baked goods such as muffins, cookies, and gluten-free bread and treats.
Having more vendors with more goods for sale at the market naturally resulted in higher sales. The 2025 market season brought in over $50,000 in gross sales, which is an enormous (and exciting!) leap from previous years.
Opening day for the market this June was also the official launch of the Huss community bike shop – the newest addition to our campus. The bike shop was funded by the $50,000 T-Mobile Hometown Grant we received last year, and this summer it was open each Saturday during the market for neighbors to shop for bikes or receive repairs/tune-ups.
Other updates you may have noticed to our market this year were: a new bike rack outside the entrance to the Imaginarium, an expanded pavilion sidewalk, and a community compost collection cart.
Our Second Saturday Art Markets brought the heat this summer with live music, art vendors, food trucks, and kid-friendly activities. Members of the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra (KSO) performed musical accompaniments each month in the Huss Children’s Garden to books such as Last Stop on Market Street and Octopus’s Garden. An inspiring addition to July’s musical storybook, Lily Brown’s Paintings, was a young, local artist named Shaquona Espinoza who created a stunning painting during the performance. Other musical acts throughout the summer markets included Mick Kolassa, LVNMUSIQ, Fritz and Friends, Faux Beamage, and the Nathan Moore Affair.
Second Saturdays expanded this season to also include six new (to Huss) food trucks, ten art vendors, and a Community Nutrition partnership with Michigan State University Extension.
We hosted our annual Back to School Celebration (once a part of Future Festival) during the August Second Saturday Art Market and over 2,000 neighbors joined! Our usual Saturday market was electrified with live music, art vendors, KSO musical storybook performance, hot dog food truck, ice cream truck, apple barrel train rides, and even a kid-friendly “Zucchini 500” race. 20 organizations participated in our Community Carnival with resource tables and educational materials, and we were able to distribute 500 backpacks filled with school supplies.
The Huss Project participated as a stop in the Three Rivers Chamber of Commerce’s annual Fall Color Tour again this October by hosting a special autumnal farmers market. Our seasonal produce selection and other market goods were joined by self-guided farm tours, nature art activities for kids, a mini-rummage sale, sheep visits, Mamazzoni’s Italian Beef food truck, and complimentary apple cider.
Continuing to nourish our summer market has meant a fundamental need for fundraising this year. The Huss Project was fortunate to have community members and local businesses choose to show their support by sponsoring the 2025 market through generous contributions. We also raised funds through sales of items like Huss Project Farmers Market t-shirts, as well as children’s books about food access which were donated by Lowry’s Books & More. In our biggest market fundraising event of the year, we hosted a farm-to-table dinner in September, which featured a three-course meal made almost entirely with local ingredients from the Huss farm. Cheesecake topped with blackberry coulis (made from Huss blackberries) was served for dessert thanks to Useless Creatures Brewing Co. The dinner was an enormous success – we raised nearly $11,000!
Even though the market season for us ends (officially) in September, we decided to “keep the good vibes going” by hosting two pop-up markets in November. These events were scaled-down, smaller versions of a typical Huss Saturday market and we hosted them inside our cozy Imaginarium. Items for sale consisted of fall vegetables from our farm, local maple syrup and honey, soup and scone mixes, Huss t-shirts, Huss ornaments, and more. Our mini-markets were an exciting way for us to continue selling produce we are growing during the cooler months, and we loved getting to see our market shoppers again!
Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who participated in the market this year. Your support is what keeps our market thriving each season, and we couldn’t do it without you.
See you in June!