My Mother’s Garden has been a local producer of culinary herbs, edible flowers, salad greens and produce, all certified organic, for 16 years in south Hillsborough County. We also raise grass-fed beef and pastured pork. Another aspect of our business is buying and selling produce with an emphasis on local and organic.

We want to bring backyard growers, small farmers, and local purveyors of value-added products together with consumers to create an online farmers’ market for our area.

WE ARE PLEASED TO WELCOME THE FOLLOWING GROWERS AND PRODUCERS TO OUR MARKET….

SANDSFOOT AQUATICS Purveyors of fine Rhode Island Red and Araucana laying hens. See the Our Growers page for more information.

RUSKIN REDNECK GORMAY TRADING CO. YOU WILL FIND THE BEST IN LOCAL SOUTHERN PRODUCTS UNDER THE PROCESSED FOODS SECTION OF THE MARKET PAGE. IN ADDITION TO THEIR SPECTACULAR PRODUCTS, THEY ALSO CREATE CUSTOM BASKETS AND WILL SHIP TO ANY YANKEE OR SOUTHERN STATE. ENJOY!!

It works like this…..

The system is meant to emulate many aspects of a traditional “booths and tables” farmers’ market. The customers are buying directly from the grower, at prices set by the grower. The grower describes what is available, supplies photos of the items, and sets the purchase price.

The customer has choices.

Just like at a traditional farmers’ market, the customer can browse everything that is available from all of the different growers. The customer can choose exactly what to buy, how much to buy, and from what grower to buy.

The customer has time to decide.

Unlike a traditional market that may be only open for a couple hours (with all the good stuff gone soon after opening), My Mother’s Garden Online Market is open for business for two days—long enough to fully browse the site and plan menus for the week.

Availability is flexible.

The growers estimate how much of each item that will be able to harvest a week ahead of time. This takes both skill and practice. Even so, unpredictable factors—such as whether or not it is sunny on a Wednesday morning—can make the difference between having a bumper crop or a very small harvest. So, the site will allow customers to keep on ordering an item even if sales have passed the estimated availability. The item might not be there when the order is put together, but then again, it just might be.

The produce is harvested to order.

After the ordering window has closed, the growers are notified of all of their orders for the week. They usually have a day or so to go out and harvest exactly what was ordered, package it, and deliver to the pick-up site.

Payment is taken when the orders are picked up.

Most markets will have a set time and location for customers to pick up their orders. Payment is not made when the order is placed through the website but is instead made in person when the order is picked up. This is because adjusting the amount owed for an order will be a common occurrence. Maybe something ran short due to bad weather, or maybe there were extra items available on the table when the customer arrived, or maybe the grower decided to adjust the price down at the last minute to account for an imperfection. In any case, it is much easier to do this in person rather than going back and trying to issue credits and adjustments through your credit card processor.

The system does keep track of customer balances, so it is possible to allow customers to conveniently pay as much as they want in advance and then “draw down” on their balance.

One aspect to this, however, is that if a customer places an order but for whatever reason does not arrive to pick it up, the customer is still responsible for paying for that order. Since everything is harvested to order, the growers still had to work to put the order together, and should therefor still get paid for that effort.

Click on the Market Page above to view this week’s offerings.