Windy Days

Xang (first image, left) and Chai (first image, right) help run a family farm and sell produce at several farmers markets in the area, with Woonsocket Farmers market being the only one run by Farm Fresh RI. Xang regularly pauses to translate what Chai says in Hmong.

Xang: Specifically in this area, when it's really windy, it's really bad. The tents will fly if there's nothing holding them down. Other than that, this market's been a good market, especially with all the help that it gets with coupons, SNAP, and everything. It really helps with everything here. A great program. 

We obviously know about Farm Fresh and the other farmers markets because we visited other farmers markets. We have other people that we know that go to farmers markets, and that's how we knew about the program. We reached out saying, ‘can we sell our stuff?’ 

This market has gotten a lot better, especially since a couple years ago. Because a couple years ago, it was a lot slower, but now, compared to back then, we're making almost twice, or more than twice as much as before. COVID wasn't the main reason, but we did see it slower during the pandemic. This year, since the pandemic is mostly over, it's a lot of people, a lot more people. We don’t get a lot of Hmong customers, but there are other Asian, Laos people, African people. Because they have something similar that they usually eat from their own culture.