Astoria Sunday Market will delay opening over virus

Published 4:13 pm Tuesday, April 14, 2020

The Astoria Sunday Market will delay the May 10 opening of its 20th season indefinitely because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The market is one of the most popular in the region, drawing large crowds to more than 100 vendors spread over three city blocks each Sunday from Mother’s Day into October.

But there is no time limit on Gov. Kate Brown’s order banning gatherings or dining in restaurants and bars to control the spread of the virus.

“Until restaurants, bars and merchants are open, we’re not open,” Cyndi Mudge, the market’s manager, said.

But Mudge is launching a locally focused pop-up beginning Sunday.

She has reached out to several farmers and other vendors to make a smaller, local market at Heritage Square near Exchange Street providing food, soap, face masks and other essential items.

“We’re encouraging 15-minute parking,” Mudge said. “Get in. Get out. Get your stuff. Go.”

The first market will feature mostly local products like produce from Kingfisher Farms and teas from North Fork 53 in Nehalem, goat cheeses from Skamokawa Farmstead Creamery in Wahkiakum County, Washington, and goat milk soap from Mary’s Milk Monsters in Astoria.

Packer Orchards from Hood River is taking online orders by 4 p.m. Thursdays for delivery at the market on Sundays. The company sells fresh fruit and value-added products like baked and canned goods, baking ingredients and jams.

The four to seven markets Packer Orchards sells at each week in normal peak season represent the biggest portion of the company’s sales, said co-owner Rochelle Packer. The company has been at the Astoria Sunday Market for 15 years.

“It means the world to us,” she said of going to markets. “We’re able to rehire some of our employees now that we have a little bit more of a wider range of area to sell our products. Our store here in Hood River is also closed.”

Market vendors around the region are on the edge of their seats waiting to see which spring markets will have a presence, Packer said.

Brown said the state needs more robust coronavirus testing and enough available hospital beds before she will consider lifting the restrictions placed on gatherings.

Mudge said she worked with the Clatsop County Public Health Department to create an event that would meet social distancing guidelines and the ban on gatherings. Each vendor at the pop-up market will have an employee designated as a social distancing officer, and the market will have sanitation stations.

Kingfisher Farms will prepackage its produce to limit touching.

Mudge doesn’t foresee the pop-up market having enough demand to grow much beyond five or six vendors, although the parking lot could accommodate up to 30 based on social distancing rules.

She had big plans for the 20th anniversary of the market that she said were dashed by the coronavirus.

“But we may end up having an authentic anniversary in that the first year’s didn’t start until July,” Mudge said with a chuckle. “And it had only 30 booths.”