Farmer's markets are popular because the food is higher quality. The reason for this is simple: it's fresher. You're buying it right after it was picked, and

Farmer's markets are popular because the food is higher quality. The reason for this is simple: it's fresher. You're buying it right after it was picked, and it was allowed to ripen fully before being picked. A lot of produce from grocery stores isn't like this: it's produced in other countries, or using methods to artificially ripen it after picking, so that it'll look ripe in the store. It's simple biology and physics: if you want freshly-picked fruit, you have to get it nearby, unless you're going to pay $$$$ to have someone ship it to you by overnight shipping (and it's not economical to ship food that way). How is some local farmer going to "help me out with whatever glitch"? He's busy running his farm. He doesn't live next door to me, he lives 20 minutes away. He might as well live across the country. But his food is probably going to be fresher and better quality than food at the supermarket that was shipped in from Central America.