Who's On First Banana Bread: Part III

The kids have been officially in business together now for a month. (And when I say “officially,” I mean not that they filed for licensure from the Better Business Bureau but that it’s been a month since they put the finishing touches on their sign, a large piece of crimson poster board that says “Who’s On First Banana Bread” in white stencil letters.) As I wrote about in Part I and Part II of the Banana Bread Blogs, the learning process began long before their first day of sales, as they divvied up the tasks required to produce their flagship product, banana bread, and set themselves on a schedule that would enable them to churn out two dozen loaves a week – which is what they’ve been selling every week so far within the first three hours of the Saturday morning market.

The next major lesson began on their first day of business earlier this month: customer relations. Rick and I sat at their table with them, and at first they were shy, hanging back and waiting for me to greet and chat with customers. “But Daddy, Mommy already knows everyone!” Tim protested when Rick urged him to follow my lead in making conversation.

“Well, how do you think Mommy got to know everyone?” Rick asked. “She makes an effort! She meets people and remembers them!”

I had to smile at Tim’s perception of me. Knowing everyone, or ninety percent of the shoppers and vendors, at Carlisle Farmers’ Market is no great feat: it’s a small town, and a rather select demographic chooses to spend their Saturdays at Farmers’ Market: old-timers, people of all ages who are already knit into the town’s fabric in various ways, or families with young children. In other words, the kinds of people I’d be likely to know.

Still, I was a little bit pleased to hear that in Tim’s eyes, I know everyone: not because the appearance of popularity amidst the Carlisle population is important to me – this isn’t middle school, after all – but because what has always been important to me is imparting the message to my children that they are among friends. That’s one reason we live in a small town, the same one in which I was raised: so that they can enjoy the rare feeling of being surrounded by familiarity. Having been an overly anxious child myself, I’ve never believed in teaching my children about so-called stranger danger; I feel they’re far safer believing that most of the adults around them are people they can trust. I believe that sense of comfort will help them be better judges of whom not to trust and whom they can turn to when a problem occurs.

But Rick convinced Tim it didn’t matter if I seemed to know everyone and he didn’t; he still needed to reach out to potential customers. So together we urged the kids forward. We reminded them to encourage people to try the samples they’d put out and to greet shoppers with “Good morning!” if there was nothing else to say. A few visitors to the market engaged them in conversation: one man told them an intriguing piece of trivia about banana distribution, and another customer quizzed them on the ingredients to prove that they really did make it themselves. By the second week, we didn’t need to push them even gently: they were into the rhythm of greeting passers-by, offering samples, chatting with their customers.

So it’s turning out to be yet another positive lesson from Farmers’ Market: greet people as friends and soon they will be. The third week, I left for an hour to go running, and when I came back, the kids gave me a rundown of who had purchased bread. “The lady whose mailbox is across the street, the lady who goes barefoot, the man from church with the plump head, and the people who do yoga with Grandma,” they said. “And some other people we don’t know yet.”

So they’re not great with names, but it’s a start. And they acknowledge that they’ll get more familiar with the clientele if they stay at it. Right now, their biggest incentive to keep their business going is sheer sales: the past two weeks they’ve sold out nearly an hour before the market closed, and needless to say, they love divvying up the cash once they get home. But they’re learning about customers and community and friends at the same time. I’m not sure which lesson will last longer, but I’m happy to see how much they’ve benefited already, with nearly three months yet to go before the market season ends.