Enriched with culture, the GNV market chronicles a story of social media, food insecurity and island mediums all with a side of fresh produce. Every Thursday, the farmers market at the Heartwood Soundstage, runs from 4 to 7 p.m.
The market opened at its downtown Gainesville location in October 2020, but attendance was low. Advertising had minimal outreach, and Dave Melosh, the owner of Heartwood Soundstage, was forced to ask a difficult question: Was he willing to give up on the market before it even had the chance to take off?
Melosh chose community. After all, that’s everything the market embodies.
“Twenty-five years ago, they started a downtown farmers market at Bo Diddley Plaza. During Covid, that was shut down,” Melosh, 41, shared. “They had pushback from the community because it really does seem like having a farmers market or shopping outside is probably a lot safer than shopping inside.”
Some of the original vendors reached out to Melosh and asked if they could use the space at Heartwood, a recording studio and concert hall on 619 S. Main St. With the help of contacts like Noah Shitama, the founder of Gainesville’s Swallowtail Farm, the market had its start. Still, that was just half the battle.
Social Media and the comeback of the GNV Market
As Melosh explains, advertising meant everything. That, and them taking over as a temporary market manager only added complications.
“We’ve shifted all of our ads to Instagram versus we were mainly advertising on Facebook. I think it has greatly improved our presence in the organic healthy food market.”
The GNV Market is just one addition to downtown Gainesville’s rebranding as a “food park and entertainment industry,” as Melosh words it. They hesitantly admit that the switch to Instagram played a large role in both the market and the area’s revival.
“It’s the good part of social media,” Melosh said. “We just got a new tenant who built her entire hair boutique based on Instagram. She was teaching us, ‘Hey this is what you need to do. You need to do content every single day and you need to post this and think about the market. Are you posting something that’s appealing?’ She was like, ‘I just looked at your Instagram and it was atrocious. It looked like a myspace page.’”
On Jan. 1, Melosh and his small team began putting forth funds into ads for their Instagram page. About 25 new vendors were brought in, and all were required to produce $10 to go directly towards advertising. Luckily, this money was not put to waste.
“I think we’re on the upswing,” Melosh said. “We’ve increased our attendance every single week, even last week when it was cold.”
The food desert in East Gainesville
One of the best outcomes from a larger audience is hopefully improving food insecurity in the area. Gainesville is home to 11 food deserts, or regions identified by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) as low-income locations with minimal access to grocery stores. One of them is in East Gainesville, where the GNV Market is located. Here, the closest grocery store is a Winn Dixie; however, this location doesn’t accept the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) that helps low-income residents receive assistance in paying for food. In 2020, an Alachua County report shows that food insecurity area has risen by about 3% since 2018, demonstrating how prevalent this issue is today.
In 2021, the GNV Market partnered with Fresh Access Bucks (FAB). According to their website, FAB “is a USDA funded statewide nutrition incentive program that increases the purchasing power of SNAP recipients to buy fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers markets, produce stands, and community grocery outlets.”
“In the last month, we’ve tripled our market attendance,” Melosh explained when discussing the program. “We’ve also started a campaign to market that aspect of our market directly. That has made a huge difference and [FAB] have had their largest number of SNAP benefit redemptions since they’ve been here.”
Community is everything
The now 36 vendors at the GNV Market each bring a unique backstory with them. Kasi Gizzie’s starts in the Virgin Islands. Gizzie, 29, was working in a surf shop in 2016 when a medium came in, claiming that she envisioned Gizzie becoming a traveling henna artist. Two years later, she started her unnamed business with a simple booth on the beach.
“After a while, people would stop me on the street and be like, ‘Are you that henna girl?’ It happened so frequently that I just jokingly started calling myself That Henna Girl,” Gizzie explained.
Since, That Henna Girl has journeyed back to her hometown of Gainesville where she participates in several weekly markets. Now working at the GNV Market for five months, Gizzie shares her passion.
“It brings a lot of people who are interested in creatives. I have recurring customers that come Monday, Thursday and Saturday. It’s like their routine,” Gizzie said.
Both Gizzie and Melosh attest that the GNV market is a grassroot of sorts for several Gainesville-based small businesses. Hard-working, authentic and friendly were just a few ways they described the vendors.
“All of these cottage businesses are really just people being super brave trying to live their dream,” Melosh confessed. “When the market’s unsuccessful, you’re basically convincing these people that their dream is stupid.”
Gizzie elaborated, “Some people go to Church and have a community. Some people go to the gym and have a community. My community just happens to be the farmers market.”
For more information about The GNV Market and That Henna Girl, visit the resources below.
The GNV Market
That Henna Girl