After being awarded a grant for farmer’s market use, the Menifee County Extension Family and Consumer Sciences program hosted a Kid’s Day at the local farmer’s market in conjunction with Customer Appreciation day. Each family with children under 18 years of age were given 10 one-dollar market vouchers to spend on fruits and vegetables at the market. Each child was given a goody bag including a MyPlate activity booklet, crayons and a pencil, a water bottle, stickers, recipe cards, a farmer’s market bingo card and a small toy (yo-yo or hacky sack). If the child was able to get bingo on their card, they could turn them in to enter their name into a drawing for one of five door prizes- two, $25 gift cards, a box of fresh vegetables (donated by the farmer’s market) and two sets of science activity books (donated by the Chamber of Commerce). The county SNAP-ed assistant set up a table to play a seed-food matching game with kids (and adults who wanted to join in the fun!) and the FCS agent provided samples of gluten-free peach muffins and summer sensation casserole for shoppers.

All 65 prepared goody bags were given out (one to each child) and $389 of Kid’s Bucks were spent at the market at this event. The farmer’s market coordinator later emailed and thanked our office stating

“We probably had the biggest crowd we have ever had, with a lot of new faces.  The kid’s day was a huge success and far exceeded our expectations.”

Other vendors stopped to say how much they enjoyed the kids being at the market and helping them fill out their bingo cards.

On the entry cards for the door prizes there was a brief survey for kids to complete. From the 38 surveys that were completed, 92% stated that they purchased a fruit or vegetable they would eat at home, 90% stated they purchased a fruit or vegetable they would help prepare at home and 100% said they would like to visit the farmer’s market another time.