New Sliding-Scale Market in Millerton Expands Access to Fresh, Local Food

A new nonprofit aims to transform the local food landscape by partnering with area farms to offer a sliding-scale market, making nutritious, locally produced foods more accessible. Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. (Food Equity, Education and Distribution), operates with the belief that food is a basic human right and that everyone should have access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food.

Now in its sixth week of operation, the Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. pop-up operates every Monday from 3 to 6 p.m. at the North East Community Center (NECC) in Millerton, and will continue through October. The market is steadily growing, attracting over 40 weekly customers. 

The pop-up market sources its vegetables from Rock Steady Farm in Millerton. It sells ground beef, cheeses and yogurt from Chaseholm Farm in Pine Plains, eggs from Overlook Farms in East Chatham, N.Y., and whole chickens from Off the Shelf Farm in New Marlborough, Mass. It also offers fish from Hudson Valley Fisheries, and supplies beans, milk and tortillas produced in Hudson, N.Y.

The market’s sliding-scale model is structured in four tiers, offering discounts of up to 75% based on customers’ budgets. “We’re buying products from local farmers at a fair price so that they are compensated fairly for what they are producing,” said Linda Quella, co-founder of Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. “And then we are working to sell it on a sliding scale to our community so that everybody has access to good local food.” This model, Quella hopes, will bridge the gap between affordability and fresh, local foods.

Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. emerged from the challenges faced by Q Farms, a Sharon, Conn., farm that Quella operated with a focus on sustainable livestock production. “Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. was formed out of a failure of our farm,” Quella said. “We raised livestock in a regenerative way, and it was very expensive. So we were finding two problems. One, that the food was just available to very privileged people in our area, and that didn’t feel good because we weren’t helping to feed and nourish our whole community. We also found that this community hasn’t regularly understood what it is to support their farmers. At farmers’ markets, people come and they may not come again for many months.”

Faced with these obstacles, Quella decided to close Q Farms and focus on a community-driven model that addresses both farmer and consumer needs. “Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. is helping people understand if you want to support your farmers, you need to support them every week,” she said. “To do that, we need to have markets that they can access. But we can’t put that burden on the farmer. Because when we did, our staff were pretty frustrated because they spent all of their time off-farm at markets, driving into the city. They were exhausted.”

Tri Corner F.E.E.D’s initiative is rooted in a comprehensive feasibility study supported by the USDA titled Planning the Tri-Corner Fair Food Initiative, which was conducted to assess the potential for a fair food pricing and local food distribution program in the tri-corner region of New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. Led by the NECC, the study explored how a community-based initiative could increase local food purchasing among households meeting the United Way ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) criteria and expand the market for regional growers practicing sustainable farming methods.

“We worked with NECC to get a federal grant. They did a survey of consumers and farmers that found that farmers don’t like to do farmers markets,” Quella said. “So, we thought that if we create the market for the farmer, all they will have to do is deliver to us, we staff it, and that takes that labor cost off the farmer.”

Charlotte Phillipps, a recent graduate of Stissing Mountain High School who works at the NECC summer teen program, shared her experience: “Three years ago, I started because it was just a summer job and something to do. But I grew to love it. It’s great to see the whole cycle of food, from the harvest at the farms we work with to bringing the food to the food pantry or to market.”

The market, still in its pilot phase, aims to subsidize lower-tier purchases through higher-tier contributions, although community support and philanthropy remain crucial components of its success.

Jordan Schmidt, food program director at the NECC, underscored the significance of NECC’s partnership with Tri-Corner F.E.E.D: “We’re really excited to be supporting Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. We run a lot of different food access programs, including a food pantry and a summer meals program for kids.” Schmidt noted that the sliding-scale market helps bridge the gap for people who cannot afford farmers’ market prices but still want to support and benefit from the regional food system.

“Instead of thinking about this as a handout, [we’re] thinking more about who we want to be as a community, and how we want to see our kids grow up and our elders age, and what kind of nourishment we want people to have access to,” Schmidt said. “We’re all better people when we’re nourished.”

Rica Bryan, one of four worker-owners at Rock Steady Farm, shared how the new pop-up market is beneficial for farmers. “We feel really grateful that Tri-Corner F.E.E.D. is able to pay us a retail price for our vegetables, which accounts for the full cost of growing them,” they said. “This allows us to pay our team a great wage and also support our business overall.”

Quella cited RollingGrocer, a brick-and-mortar sliding-scale grocery store in Hudson, N.Y., as one of her inspirations for Tri Corner F.E.E.D’s sliding-scale market. “The advantage they have is they get foot-traffic,” Quella said. “One of our challenges, if we want to do this as a brick-and-mortar, which is our goal, is to find a location that can be accessible to everyone. That’s why we’re doing the pop-up this year, to see if people are interested. I think they are.”