Competition

This coming Saturday we'll be vending at the Tilth Harvest Fair, a lovely event celebrating organic produce. It will be our ninth year doing this event.

The first four years we sold there, they had a number of other food vendors, but the past four years we've been the only ones. It's a great position to be in: the only food vendor at an event that draws exactly the kind of people who enjoy our food.

This year there's going to be another food vendor, a catering company that did the event the first few years, but dropped out a few years ago. The organizers are happy about it, but I'm not thrilled. I'd rather not share.

After twelve years of vending at farmers' markets and special events, I'm still not certain whether having competition always negatively affects my sales. The Ballard Market, our best market, has the most competition. Last year at Columbia City there was no competition, and this year Green Go is there, but we're having a better year this year than we did last year. There are so many variables, and sometimes having a choice of what to eat can draw more people to an event, or make them more inclined to stay and have lunch.

The weather is supposed to be perfect on Saturday, and last year at this event, we weren't able to feed everyone (we ran out of food.) This year we'll bring more, and I'm trying to maintain a good attitude, telling myself that that there will be enough business to go around. Still, I'd rather not share.