Abstract
Although farmers’ markets offer healthy foods for purchase, many lack the equipment necessary to process convenient, card-based transactions. We assessed the impact of providing wireless terminals to 5 markets on overall sales and redemption of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. Sales increased significantly at 4 of the 5 markets after implementation of the terminals, and overall sales increased above and beyond SNAP redemption alone. Implementation of wireless terminals may be important for improving the financial stability and accessibility of farmers’ markets.
With the increased popularity of the “buy local” movement, demand is growing for venues selling locally grown foods, such as farmers’ markets.1–4 These venues offer the potential to expand access to fresh, healthy foods for a variety of consumers, in particular low-income consumers.5,6 Farmers’ markets, for example, can become certified to accept benefits from food assistance programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).7,8 However, barriers exist that limit the full use of such benefits.
For instance, many farmers’ markets operate in temporary locations that lack electricity, making card-based transactions requiring plug-in terminals difficult to process.9,10 This can limit both the convenience of card-based purchasing for all consumers and accessibility of markets to SNAP participants. With the conversion of SNAP benefits from paper coupons to electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards, SNAP redemption at markets dropped from $6.4 million in 1994 to $3.8 million in 1998.11 SNAP redemption has since increased, with more than $7.5 million in benefits redeemed in 2010.12 Despite this increase, only 0.01% of all SNAP benefits were redeemed at farmers’ markets that year.12
In this pilot study, we investigated the impact of wireless terminal use on overall and EBT sales at farmers’ markets. We hypothesized that implementation of wireless terminals would increase SNAP redemption and overall sales at these markets.
METHODS
Farmers’ market managers in Arizona were e-mailed a short description of the study. To participate, markets were required to have a minimum of 2 fruit and vegetable vendors operating weekly and could not have used a wireless terminal in the past. Of 38 qualifying markets, 5 urban, outdoor farmers’ markets consented (3 from Phoenix and 2 from Flagstaff). Baseline sales data (before terminal implementation) were collected on a weekly basis across a 10-week period (July–September 2009). Wireless terminals were then provided to markets at the beginning of their 2010 seasons, and sales data were collected from July through September 2010 to control for seasonality.
We used weekly sales data over a 20-week period to analyze overall before-to-after intervention effects. PASW Statistics 18 software (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL) was used to conduct a mixed-effects model analysis with log-transformed weekly sales data (as a correction for skewness) as the dependent variable.13 We examined the fixed effect of time (before and after the intervention) clustered within individual farmers’ markets and adjusted for week of data collection (to control for week-to-week fluctuations in market sales).
We also used the Kruskal–Wallis rank order test to explore individual changes in average sales from before to after the intervention. Given the small sample size, a nonparametric test was performed to account for nonnormal distribution of data. To account for potential type I error inflation from conducting multiple comparisons, we set the significance level at P < .01 using the conservative Bonferroni correction method.
RESULTS
Markets varied in size from 25 to 70 vendors. Across markets overall, average 10-week sales during the preintervention period were $2760; average sales increased to $4686 after the intervention. The results of the mixed model analysis (Table 1) indicate that, overall, postintervention sales were higher than preintervention sales, but differences did not quite reach significance (P = .075). The model did not show any effect of week of data collection on sales.
TABLE 1—
Fixed Time (Preintervention and Postintervention) and Week Effects Predicting Weekly Sales Data: 5 Arizona Farmers’ Markets, 2010
| b (95% Confidence Interval) | SE (df) | t | P | |
| Time | 0.55 (−0.08, 1.18) | 0.27 (7.78) | 2.06 | .075 |
| Wk | 0.03 (−0.05, 0.55) | 0.24 (10.75) | 0.13 | .902 |
At 4 of the 5 farmers’ markets included in the study, postintervention sales ranked significantly higher than preintervention sales (Figure 1). Overall increases in sales at these markets ranged from $500 to $4018 over the 10-week study period. One market showed a decline in overall sales, but the change was not statistically significant. EBT sales across all farmers’ markets over the 10-week postintervention period ranged from $105 to $557.
FIGURE 1—
Comparison of sales before and after implementation of wireless terminals: 5 Arizona farmers’ markets, 2010.
Note. EBT = electronic benefit transfer.
*P < .01 (significant preintervention–postintervention difference based on Kruskal–Wallis rank order nonparametric test).
DISCUSSION
The results of this pilot study show that implementation of wireless terminals increased sales at farmers’ markets. These additional sales accounted for the advent of new EBT purchases as well as increases in general purchases. This suggests the potential importance of wireless terminal use at farmers’ markets, which could increase opportunities for financial success while broadening access for low-income consumers. In at least 3 of the 5 farmers’ markets in our sample, the increase in overall sales would more than cover the cost of wireless terminals.
Some states, such as Iowa and California, offer free wireless terminals to farmers’ markets to support increased access to healthy, local foods.11,14 Provision of free or subsidized access to wireless terminals is a potential policy solution to improve EBT redemption at farmers’ markets as well as to enhance markets’ financial viability.
Our study had several limitations. Because this was a pilot investigation, our sample size was small and the markets varied in size and revenue. Also, this was a quasi-experimental study and did not include a control group. However, we were able to adjust for this limitation by using 10 data points, allowing more stable baseline and postimplementation measures in our analyses. Finally, wireless technology can suffer from potential drawbacks, including cost of use, reliability of signal, and battery life, and these issues could be more problematic in rural areas than in urban areas such as those examined here.
Future research should explore the impact of wireless terminals on farmers’ market sales over longer periods of time and with larger sample sizes. Because promotion of terminals could greatly improve use of farmers’ markets by consumers, future studies should also assess how to maximize awareness of technology among consumers, including advertising the availability of wireless terminals to multiple populations.15,16
Acknowledgments
This study was funded by the Farmers Market Promotion Program, US Department of Agriculture (grant 12-25-G-0689).
Human Participant Protection
This study was approved by the Arizona State University institutional review board. Participants provided informed consent prior to the start of the study.
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