Gig Harbor Start-Ups: why local markets matter

It was only five years ago when the City of Gig Harbor and the Downtown Waterfront Alliance collaborated to create the seasonal Downtown Waterfront Farmers Market. We are so excited for season to begin on the first Thursday of June!

This month we couldn’t resist reaching out to a couple of the local vendors to learn more about them while we patiently wait for the market to open.

Meet Gig Harbor small business owners:  A Small Specialty and the Fox Island Trading Company.

You may already know her from her delicious freshly-made specialty salsas, vegetable ketchups, stone ground mustards and hot sauces. Rebecca Small, owner of A Small Specialty, describes how she got started:

“I started with the market when they first launched, and my experiences there have been phenomenal. I do fresh squeezed lemonades and I take it a step further because I get my berries and some of my local produce from the other vendors there.” While strawberry lemonade is by far her biggest seller, she creates flavors such as watermelon cucumber or mango jalapeño.

“I love farmer’s markets, everyone is so happy and people are excited about the experience and the passion behind the product and the person making it. I take my sauce making very seriously. I buy my produce the day I blend my produce. I finish all my salsas and sauces with hand squeezed limes.”

Rebecca’s business was just beginning when the downtown waterfront market launched. She explains “doing the farmer’s market has really helped me to promote my business. I really try to stay local cause I live in Gig Harbor, I work in Gig Harbor, I support local farmers here, what products I cannot get from the market, I will buy from local stores. This is my backyard.”

While she still works for corporate America, her dream is to be able to work full-time selling at Pierce County farmer’s markets. Taste her lemonade and sauces at the market. She also sells her products at the Harbor General Store, Finholm’s Market and Island View Market.

Three years ago, Andre and Kim Henson, combined their knowledge and passion to create the Fox Island Trading Company.

A couple of adventure loving self sustainability and cosmeceutical ingredients junkies with a passion for creating spa grade bath and body products using real and natural ingredients. We combine our passion for the great outdoors and earth friendly ideas with creativity and homeopathic knowledge to create products that are safe and gentle as well as nourishing and therapeutic.We try to regionally source as many ingredients as we can. We use natural raw honey and beeswax from our apiary right here at FITC.

Andre: Three years. When we first starting doing it, we were primarily focused on spa. My background is in cosmeceutical chemistry. Everything we make it skincare grade. When we got to the point that we wanted to go direct to our customers, and because we are kinda raw and focus on local ingredients, the Gig Harbor market has been such a blessing to us. It’s been wonderful, we couldn’t do it without it. We primarily focus on doing events and festivals , we do a lot of dermatology conferences. The market is one we would never miss. We went full time with our business with the market. When we first moved here I was working for a skincare company and I was traveling a lot prior to that, and when we opened and started working for the Gig Harbor Farmer’ market, we had such a good acceptance, and such great wonderful people. Literally it was the market that pushed us to be able to go full time. Primarily 99% of the finished product is made right here on Fox Island in a studio that we have on our property. We do our own distillation of oils, extracts and everything. One of our new partners for our lavender is right here in Gig Harbor, we go there and pick almost two hundred pounds of lavender just to make oils for our products. From Fox Island itself, we get our honey from our hives, and Eucalyptus and Rosemary from our neighbor’s nursery. We got lucky with amazing neighbors! This is all we do now, it’s a family affair that we’ve got going.

Their goal is to someday have a downtown brick and mortar in location. We can teach people and do education, learn about how we can get raw ingredients and raw vitamins from materials that you can apply topically.

We have a really good loyal clientele at the market.

The market will be open every Thursday from 1-7pm until September 6th, with the exception of the 4th of July.