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BFJ
105,8 Conceptualising community
consumption
Farmers' markets and the older consumer
542 Isabelle Szmigin
The Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham,
Birmingham, UK
Sarah Maddock
Department of Strategy and Marketing, Gloucestershire Business School,
Cheltenham, UK, and
Marylyn Carrigan
The Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham,
Birmingham, UK
Keywords Farmers, Markets, Consumers, Older people, Food industry
Abstract Since the late 1990s farmers' markets have been growing in popularity as an alternative
outlet for: healthy, local, organic and non-organic, produce consistent with the values of green and
ethical consumers, local and small producers to sell their goods and a venue where direct contact with
the producers is possible and information about the goods may be sought. This paper seeks to explore
further the concept of community as a key attribute of such markets. The paper argues that farmers'
markets can provide many of the exchanges consistent with the concept of community and that these
are of significant importance to many shoppers but are particularly valued by older consumers.

British Food Journal
Vol. 105 No. 8, 2003
pp. 542-550
# MCB UP Limited
0007-070X
DOI 10.1108/00070700310497291
Introduction
The establishment in 1997 of the first UK farmers' markets came at a
significant time in the history of British food marketing and consumption.
Years of food scares often related to intensive farming and the consumers'
ignorance of the supply chain lead to increased suspicion of the food available
to us. Fear regarding the safety of food may be seen within the context of the
``risk society'' (Beck, 1992) in which science is regarded as playing a central role
in the production of food and hence the risk and threat to our health. Concerns
regarding food ingredients and additives, methods of food production,
including animal welfare, and the impact of these factors on the environment
have been well documented and are often presented as key drivers in the
growth of alternative food groups, such as the organic food market (Harper and
Makatouni, 2002). More recently, increasing scrutiny has been applied to the
food industry (Humphreys, 2002), supermarkets (www.corporatewatch.org.uk)
fast food (Schlosser, 2001), and government collusion with the food industry
(Monbiot, 2000). Supermarkets, rather than manufacturers, have become the
focus for consumer reactions against specific food types, as evidenced by the
protests against genetically modified foods (Pearce and Hansson, 2000). One
result of such prolonged enquiry into our food and the nature of its supply has
been an increased concern and indeed mistrust, leading some groups of Conceptualising
consumers to more ``careful consumption'' (Marsden, 1998). community
Although the development of the farmers' markets is generally regarded as a consumption
success, only 30 per cent of consumers have reportedly bought foods directly
from the producer including farm shops and Internet purchases, as well as
farmers' markets (IGD, 2002) whereas double this number expressed an interest
in buying local food. Studies on the consumer profile at farmers' markets 543
indicate a female buyer over the age of 55, and a high proportion of retired
people, although markets situated in urban locations tend to have younger
patrons (Youngs and Holden, 2002). The markets are noted for selling ``fresh,
quality, tasty local produce'', goods do not have to be organic although there is
an assumption that much of it complies with such standards or is produced in a
less intensive, more sustainable manner than food available from most other
retailers. Most of those attending the market have travelled a maximum of 10
miles and tend to be regular users, shopping at particular farmers' markets
over a period of time. Previous research suggests that other important
attributes of the markets include: the enjoyable experience of getting to know
the stallholders, availability of information on the products, opportunities to
taste prior to purchase and that, by using the market, support is being given to
the local producers (Youngs and Holden, 2002).
The patronage of farmers' markets may be viewed in a number of ways and
certainly the research to date reveals a range and depth of motivations for
buying food from such markets. Supporting farmers' markets may be seen as a
route to boycotting supermarkets (Monbiot, 2000). Holloway and Kneafsey
(2000) take this further by suggesting that farmers' markets can represent a
space of resistance. This describes farmers' markets as a revolutionary
phenomenon but Holloway and Kneafsey (2000) also argue that some
consumers may identify with farmers' markets due to conservative, reactionary
principles, which look for a traditional, homely source of food shopping.
Shopping at farmers' markets may be seen as supporting green consumption
whereby certain products or practices are actively avoided while certain
purchases may represent a positive alternative, e.g. in relation to organic or
free-range production (Schaefer and Crane, 2001; Strong, 1996). The choice to
use farmers' markets may also reflect consumption as a means to help
construct a person's identity and lifestyle (Schaefer and Crane, 2001), the
consumption of say organic foods can be used and manipulated by consumers
for their sign value. The drive for localization of food is another important
motivator and one that has been recognised in the literature (Holloway and
Kneafsey, 2000; La Trobe, 2001). Harper and Makatouni (2002) have identified
``food miles'' as being of particular concern to ethically driven consumers. This
issue has also been recognised by the UK government who commissioned a
report on the future of farming and food in 2001. The central theme of the report
was the idea of ``reconnection'', including reconnecting consumers with their
food and where it has come from. Farmers' markets are seen by some as a direct
response to this re-localization (Aslet, 2002) being generally restricted in terms
BFJ of the geographic range from where their stock may be sourced. The issue of
105,8 local production is extremely important to The National Association of
Farmers' Markets who define farmers' markets as venues where ``farmers,
growers or producers from a defined local area are present in person''
(www.farmersmarkets.net). There may also be a perception of the high
``quality'' of the goods, speciality or unusual items (Holloway and Kneafsey,
544 2000). Finally, the nature of the interaction at a farmers' market may be a
driving force for participation. The consumer comes into direct contact with the
producer, sees the person that produced the food they will take home with
them, and is able to interact and even quiz them about their produce. The
National Association of Farmers' Markets considers this to be important for
gaining the confidence of the public and regards the markets as a mechanism
that allows the consumer to ``get closer to the source of local foods''
(www.farmersmarkets.net).
This list is not intended to be exhaustive, however it acts as the pivotal
point for introducing a key concept of this paper, that farmers' markets
stimulate an important and often missing ingredient in everyday food
shopping, the idea of community. In exploring the notion of community as a
motivating factor for farmers' market usage this paper will focus on one
group of user in particular, the older consumer. It will discuss the importance
of developing concepts beyond the purely functional usage motivations for
farmers' markets and examine how a notion such as community may help to
explain the growing popularity of this form of shopping for the British
consumer. By focusing on the older consumer we are examining a portion of
the population who are generally underrepresented in marketing literature
but who exhibit a number of attributes and needs which the patronage of
farmers' markets may meet. Many older consumers are both innovative and
community oriented and are not always best served by supermarkets. A
preliminary study undertaken by the authors in late 2002 and early 2003
observed farmers' market shoppers in Worcestershire and Gloucestershire
and noted the high incidence of older consumers. While farmers' markets in
metropolitan areas such as London may not evidence such a high proportion
of older consumers, our experience in the provinces leads us to believe that
conceptualising their behaviour in relation to shopping at farmers' markets
would be a significant contribution to understanding the growing popularity
of this form of shopping. The proportion of older consumers patronising
farmers' markets is also supported by empirical studies such as that by
Holloway and Kneafsey (2000) who found in their study of the Stratford
farmers' market that the age group 51-65 dominated.

Farmers' markets as community

Supermarkets do not provide the consumer with a sense of community. They
provide, through loyalty cards and promotional offers, a lop-sided relationship
whereby the supermarket identifies the reward system and the consumer takes
it or leaves it (Szmigin, 2003). For many consumers there is nothing wrong with
this, leading busy lives, often income rich and time poor, they accept what is on Conceptualising
offer and take the line of least resistance. It could be argued that the community
introduction and growth of Internet supermarket shopping will see a further consumption
decline in personal interactions. Older people are often disadvantaged within
the supermarket and also as a result of supermarket expansion. The typical
``buy one get one free'' promotion is rarely useful to a single pensioner, while the
whole notion of loyalty cards is based on the more you spend the more you save 545
rather than price reduction at point of sale. The demise of small local shops,
which might be seen as the older person's natural shopping community, has
been well documented (www.corporatewatch.org.uk). It has been argued that
for independent retailers to survive they must offer ``product specialisation,
service and location'' (Baron et al., 2001). For the small food retailer this has
often been related to a focus on healthier food, friendliness, personalised
experience and retailer experience, all attributes provided by the farmers'
markets. The supermarket shopping experience is one of alienation rather than
communication. As La Trobe (2001) has pointed out, interaction between
shoppers is minimised by the design, which produces efficient circulation with
maximum exposure to products. Similarly the employee is likely to have
limited interaction with the shopper as checkout staff are primarily concerned
with the processing of the goods while the consumer is often also required to be
part of the process in packing their own bags as quickly as possible before the
next customer is served.
So choosing to shop at farmers' markets may be seen, at least in part, as a
positive choice not only in favour of local food but also in reducing our reliance
on supermarket shopping and the experience it entails. The work of
Hirschmann (1970) supports such a conceptualisation. He described a number
of possible scenarios that customers could pursue when faced with ``failing''
companies, organisations or even countries; these were coined exit, voice and
loyalty. Many of his thoughts foresaw the anti-consumer movement of recent
years. One of Hirschmann's key points was that exit is not available to all in
every situation. While he referred to the inability for most of us to remove
ourselves from the state, education, or health organisations, as we do not have
readily available alternatives, this is also true for many consumers faced with
limited choices in what ostensibly appears to be a limitless marketplace.
Pensioners with inadequate bus services are restricted in their shopping
opportunities as are the unemployed living on state benefit. However, it may be
this very inability to affect large parts of our lives that leads some to be
proactive in areas where they feel they can make some difference. Frequenting
a farmers' market may not at first glance seem like an act of resistance but it
may be seen as a positive choice. What may seem at times to be a disparate and
disjointed consumer resistance movement has moved from the fringes of
society to include broader social class and circumstance. Today a consumer
rebel is as likely to come from the ranks of ABC1 pensioners, and can no longer
be stereotyped as an irrelevant lunatic fringe (The Economist, 2001; Voight,
2000). Patronage of farmers' markets as a revolutionary or reactionary
BFJ response should be just as expected from older consumers as from a generation
105,8 of younger shoppers.
Just as shopping can elicit a negative reaction it can also bring us closer to
others and form a sense of community. A useful model of community within a
consumption context is that developed by Muniz and O'Guinn (2001). They
suggest the notion of a brand community, those supporters and endorsers of
546 particular consumer brands. In particular they refer to a ``consciousness of
kind'' evident in the brand communities they investigated; citing Cova (1997)
they say that ``the link is more important than the thing''. Muniz and O'Guinn
(2001) suggest there is a shared component among those in brand communities
which includes:
. A consciousness of kind ± a collective sense of connection to the brand
but more importantly to one another.
. Shared rituals and traditions ± that come about through shared
consumption experiences and help to form and maintain the culture of
the community.
. A sense of moral responsibility ± this is a sense of duty to the
community and to the members of that community; it helps with the
cohesion of the group.
While Muniz and O'Guinn (2001) were looking specifically at mainstream
brands such as IBM and Saab, their findings particularly in relation to how
consumption can bring people together to form ``this consciousness of kind''
seems particularly relevant to small consumer communities such as farmers'
markets. At one time perhaps this was also true of other consumption contexts,
say of organic foods, but is less so now as this market has been effectively
incorporated into mainstream consumption through its appropriation by the
supermarkets. It is significant that again supermarkets are muscling in on this
alternative consumption community by holding farmers' markets in their car
parks and foyers. La Trobe (2001) reports on one hosted by Asda in 1999 on the
Isle of Dogs and another by Tesco outside its West Kensington store. It is
important to remember that a sense of community can help to delineate what
the membership is not, as well as what it is. Englis and Solomon (1997) and
Hogg and Savolainen (1997) have both identified the importance of
consumption, marking exclusion from various lifestyles as well as marking
inclusion. While holding farmers' markets at supermarkets may be good to
build awareness, it is questionable whether in the long term there is
compatibility between two such different supply chains. Finally it is worth
noting that community does not need to be defined in spatial terms. There are
obviously many consumption communities that are located within
geographical boundaries and find the spatial context useful in terms of defining
themselves, Fairtrade towns might be one example of this phenomenon.
Having said this, they rarely confine themselves solely to their physical
environment, using the Internet in particular as a way of developing the
community through conversation (Levine et al., 2000). Although farmers' Conceptualising
markets are clearly spatially located in the physical sense, the sense of community
community we suggest is more to do with trying to find an alternative, if only consumption
in part, to the hegemony of the supermarket and a positive choice in turning to
local producers to circumvent the ubiquity of the retail supply chain.

The older consumer 547

The notion of an older consumer may be viewed in relative terms. There is
much debate about the age cut-off for what an older consumer should be, but
for the purposes of this study we have considered 50 as an indicator because as
well as being frequently used as the starting point of the mature years life-cycle
by numerous researchers in North America (Roberts and Zhou, 1997; Miller,
1993; Zhou and Chen, 1992), it is a common segmentation benchmark for UK
practitioners such as the Sports Council (1994), the Carnegie Inquiry into the
Third Age (1993).
Older consumers have not traditionally received much attention from
marketing (Long, 1998; Silvers, 1997), partly this is because marketers have
believed older people to be relatively set in their ways and unwilling to try new
brands. But research stemming from a growing interest in this group, a group
that is powerful both in terms of its size and potential economic power, has
revealed that this is not necessarily the case. Studies have found that older
people are major consumers of luxury products such as vacations, automobiles
and alcohol as well as the traditional categories associated with them such as
financial products (Sawchuck, 1995). Many older consumers have disposable
income, which they are willing to spend, and indeed may not be as sensitive to
price as younger consumers (Moschis et al., 2000). Carat Insight (1998)
identified that the over 55s are 48 per cent more likely to spend their day
shopping and are 14 per cent more likely to eat out than other adults.
Increasingly it is older consumers who are using the Internet (TreÂguer, 1999).
Importantly as Leventhal (1997) discovered the older consumer does try new
products but for different reasons than the younger market. Rather than just
buying for the sake of newness, they are more critical and make comparisons
with competitive offerings.
There has been some tentative evidence to suggest that older consumers
may be among the growing population of ``ethical consumers''. A recent Mintel
report claimed that the ethical consumer is most likely to be aged over 35 (Cowe
and Williams 2001), while Abrahams (1996) reported that 53 per cent of the
over 55s would be willing to take action (including breaking the law) against
unethical corporate behaviour. Research by Cowe and Williams (2001) into
ethical consumption discovered that the largest segment of UK ethical
consumers, the ``Do what I can'' group consisted of mainly over-65s. This group
were the most active recyclers of household waste, and deliberately sought
recycled products. Additionally, they found that 29 per cent of conscientious
consumers (those with strong ethical purchasing agendas) were aged over 55.
Older consumers are also enthusiastic purchasers of organic products, forming
BFJ 36 per cent of ``organophiles'' in a recent UK study (Mintel International Group,
105,8 2001). So, in summary, the older consumer is less likely to be stuck in their
ways, less cautious in spending and less satisfied with the status quo in terms
of food products. They are increasingly likely to be among the ranks of the
ethically motivated and adventurous in terms of food consumption. As such
their patronage of farmers' markets would seem like an obvious outlet both for
548 their concern and their preferences.

Discussion ± farmers markets, older consumers and a sense of

community
So how can we conceptualise this connection between older consumers and
farmers' markets? This group of consumers is too often perceived of as
carefully conservative with limited spending power and uninterested in new
forms of retailing. In reality these people exhibit very diverse forms of purchase
behaviour, they are influenced by a wide range of motivators many of which
would suggest some compatibility between the needs of the older consumer
and the benefits offered by farmers' markets. One could put forward a range of
reasons why we should expect the older consumer to frequent farmers'
markets. Some will be retired and have more time to do their shopping: quite
simply they will not need to rush around the supermarket getting all their
weekly shopping in one place. They may simply enjoy the shopping experience
at the farmers' market; Youngs and Holden (2002) in their study on alternative
food retailing formats noted that ``older people felt comfortable with the
traditional methods of purchasing ± small shops and manageable, local stall
holders''. Many, as has been noted above, are likely to be both more innovative
and discerning in their food choices and will therefore actively seek out new
quality food items. One might also argue that older consumers' attraction to
farmers' markets could be construed as a reactionary form of consumption, as
Holloway and Kneafsey (2000) say, ``a re-entrenchment of nostalgic and
socio-politically conservative notions of place and identity''. Alternatively as
the older consumer constitutes a group with strong ethical motivations, their
selection of farmers' markets as a shopping venue could be seen as a
revolutionary response. As such, each of these elements doubtless contribute to
both specific and general motivations for consumers' usage. But, above all,
older people are likely to be attracted and contribute to a sense of community as
identified by Muniz and O'Guinn (2001) in terms of a consciousness of kind and
shared rituals but possibly most importantly a sense of moral responsibility to
local food producers. Holloway and Kneafsey (2000) give an optimistic
presentation of this, saying that farmers' markets develop ``ethical notions of
community and co-operation''. As they rightly say we still need to undertake
further research to appreciate the range of motivations and involvement so as
to understand more fully consumers' decisions to participate, but as a starting
point for this research we suggest that we should look more closely at the
underpinning notion of community both in terms of what it contributes to
consumers' lives and in terms of how it is currently missing from their existing
lifestyles. If we are to find that community is central to our understanding of Conceptualising
why older consumers frequent farmers' markets the implications are numerous community
in terms of location, developing rapport between producers and consumers, consumption
encouraging other age groups to be involved, and ensuring an appropriate and
profitable growth for the farmers' market movement.

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