Selling whole chicken at farmers market?

Ok I tried searching the archives and web and I still need more info. How are chicken farmers selling their chicken at farmers markets? Are they sold frozen, fresh, or are the chickens advertised and pre-ordered? How big of a risk is there for the meat to spoil? How is spoiling prevented? I just got home from the market today and it was HOT outside. We don't have very many pastured chicken available localy, so I havn't seen offered at the market.

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Keeping the meat fresh is relatively easy; selling home processed meat will depend on federal and state ordinances, and probably why you aren't seeing it offered at the farmer's market.

If you can find a community near Asians, Latinos or Middle Easteners, you can sell them live. They will buy it and take it home to slaughter. Do count on them examining the chickens before they purchase. I know in the San Francisco Bay Area, they will sell Silkies for $6 each. Yes, a SILKIE because they like the flavor better and believe it has medicinal properties. Price for RIR is the same even though it is much bigger. And yes, the animal rights activist do protest in front of the farmer stand.

We would like to sell at farmers markets but county regulations make it too difficult. We sell ours by pre-order and people pick them up at one of our drop-off locations.

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I have been through the whole state and federal run around and I'm fully aware of what I need to do. What I'm not sure on at this point is whether or not the market manager will allow the sale of meat. But say everything is legit, You have a potential buyer come up to your stand and wants to buy a couple chickens but will continue shopping in the hot summer weather. What do you do? if they left your table and went straight home, I don't see a problem. Do customers need a cooler to keep the chicken cold?

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I have been through the whole state and federal run around and I'm fully aware of what I need to do. What I'm not sure on at this point is whether or not the market manager will allow the sale of meat. But say everything is legit, You have a potential buyer come up to your stand and wants to buy a couple chickens but will continue shopping in the hot summer weather. What do you do? if they left your table and went straight home, I don't see a problem. Do customers need a cooler to keep the chicken cold?

You would defiately need at least an ice cooler to keep the meat in on site, and I'm thinking you might have to have a refrigerator depending on regulatuons. My mother carries an ice cooler in her trunk for groceries, I just keep perishables in a covered cardboard box with the frozens sitting over the milk, meat, etc........................ and run the air in the summer until I get home.

I think that once people know you are going to be at the market on a regular basis, they would either buy their chicken just before they head home or bring a small cooler to keep it in.

You could also consider holding sold chickens in a cooler for customers to pick up on their way out of the market. That way you won't lose a potential customer who forgets to return to buy a chicken. If your market booth has electricity, a small refrigerator is helpful, but if not a commercial cooler with ice on the bottom and over the chickens will keep them cold. In our state we can sell them fresh or frozen at the farmers' market.

I've purchased whole and cut up chickens from a farmer that had a small freezer at the farmers market. He had it in the bed of his pickup truck with an extension cord to the electrical hook up. This would be dependent upon the market having reasonable access to electricity of course. It was not a problem to carry around the frozen chicken while continuing shopping.

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This is true, there is a big market for live birds in all the ethnic communties, and the reason being is they like older tough roosters for the flavor and have way's to cook the meat and make it tender in there recipes. Some breeds also sell better in these places due to there customs, Silkies being one as mentioned because Asians feel the black skin and meat has medicinal properties, which may or may not be true but they think so. Another main reason for the demand for live birds in these communities is butchering, they have been doing it as young children in their countries of origin for years and it isn't a big deal for them to take a live old rooster home and butcher it in the backyard in a few minutes. They don't freak out like most Americans do, ( you know the ones I speak of ) about whether the bird has had it's last rights administered and pondered for weeks on all the various goofy methods for killing the bird.

It is common where I live to see Imigrants carrying a feed sack with a few birds in it, toss it in the back seat and go home only to have it for dinner in a matter of hours. And they do bring very good prices for old spent roosters.