Kwantlen Street Market Returns at New Venue

The market will be open on the Richmond campus until Oct. 31
Kyrsten Downton, Contributor

The small but popular Kwantlen Street Market is back at KPU’s Richmond campus for a new season, time, and location. This year, the Kwantlen Student Association-run market will be held every Tuesday from 12 to 4 until the end of October.

The market itself has moved from the back parking lot to the front entrance plaza of KPU’s Richmond campus, directly off of Lansdowne Road. It is now nestled between the garden beds that the KPU Sustainable Agriculture students use to grow the produce that they sell.

“We love it,” says fourth year Agriculture student Emily Mceachern, about the Kwantlen Street Market. “We want somewhere to sell our produce. We like that this was so close and helpful. It’s a lot easier for us to just go 20 feet from where we are growing.”

Anne Janzen, the events manager for the Kwantlen Street Market, says that working with KPU students has been a rewarding experience for her. Her goal is to get more students involved, either as volunteers or as vendors for their own small businesses.

“The skills you develop when you go into business for yourself can not be taught by working for someone else,” she says. “You will never forget the things you learned. You will always think back to that time when you were a student and you tried this business thing and you are going to smile. I really believe that this is the experience we can offer students here.”

However, there have been some mixed reactions to the new location. Mceachern says that the free parking at the event was more difficult to use this year than it had been in the past. Fortunately, the market is also much more visible to the public now, and has drawn more attention as a result.

“It has its pros and cons, but I still think overall, it is a good location,” says Mceachern.

Janzen says that, by the end of the last season, the Kwantlen Street Market was almost completely blocked from view due to the construction of the new Wilson School of Design building.

“The vendors much prefer being on a busy street than being behind the construction,” she says. “We didn’t have a choice—we had to move. Now, we are starting to see more people come out from the community and figure out where we are located.”

The Kwantlen Street Market sells a variety of fresh produce, SPCA-certified chicken and eggs, baked goods, and other products. Janzen says that the goal is to expand into a larger market but remain focused on only selling great products.

“You get the very best of the best here. It’s a small market that we are looking to grow but we are not going to grow ourselves out of business,” she says. “We are going to feature the highest quality and grow from there.”