Farmer’s Market – Redux

I was telling a friend last night that I went to the Farmer’s Market that morning, and she replied that she did her best to avoid that particular market because everything was so expensive.

I actually did a bit of cost comparison yesterday when I went to the Farmer’s Market. Mainly because after I went to the market, I went on a planned trip to Whole Foods to pick up a few odds and ends I can’t get anywhere else. I decided to price out some of the items that I had seen at the Farmer’s Market as well. I was surprised to see that a lot of the fruits and veggies priced out exactly when looking at cost per pound. A few things were a cent off ($2.49 at Whole Foods, $2.50 at the market). Of course, with taxes, that makes it a few more cents off, but overall the prices were the same. I didn’t price everything at my regular grocery store, but I do know that apples were exactly the same price.

So what makes the Farmer’s Market worth it? Well, number one, I enjoy the experience. I look forward to walking up to the market on Saturday mornings and seeing what they have to offer. I frequently pick up fruits or veggies I wouldn’t normally buy, just to try something different that week. But more importantly, I like supporting local growers. For the most part, I feel like I’m buying better quality products as well. The products are fresh and the people are passionate about what they’re selling.

So maybe it’s not the most frugal choice. But I’m not really spending any more money than I would be, and I enjoy it. Can’t complain. I’m eating an apple I bought yesterday as I type, and it is absolutely delicious.

Megan Smith

Megan is a 40-something government employee in the Washington, DC area. She got interested in Personal Finance when she got out of college and realized that her paycheck wasn’t going to go as far as she had hoped. Since starting this blog, she has managed to buy a house and make a solid start on her retirement goals, and hopes to help others do the same. Here is her story:

In 2007, I was a gainfully employed 20-something with no debt but not a lot of knowledge about personal finance.  It was a co-worker’s comment about Roth IRAs that sent me to the internet, searching for information.  It was then that I realized that I really didn’t know a whole lot about personal finance and that my current financial situation was due a lot to inherent frugal tendencies, generous family members, a fear of debt, and good luck.  While that was working for me, clearly I needed a better plan.

While I had no debt, I was also pretty much living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about going over budget (I say this as if I had a real budget) because I had an emergency fund set aside to cover any overages.

Except that’s not what an emergency fund is for.

So I did a lot of research, read a lot of blogs, and decided that I needed a plan.  I needed to budget.  I needed to know what I was spending my money on.  I needed to prepare for the future.

I decided to create a blog not only to make myself accountable to others but also to share the knowledge that I gained along the way.  I’ve learned so much from my fellow bloggers, and I hope that my readers can find something useful in what I have to share as well.