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                MARKET PROFILE
Washington, DC, and Baltimore: A Tale of Two Produce Cities
Capital region wholesalers distribute produce to prosperous mid-atlantic customers.
By Bob Johnson and FDoug Ohlemeier
resh produce is big business in the nation’s capital. Headquartered in the area between Washington, DC, and Baltimore, multiple produce whole- salers play a critical role in distributing
fresh produce to retail, wholesale and foodser- vice customers throughout the Mid-Atlantic and Eastern Seaboard.
“It’s our proximity to so many different cities,” says Don Martin, vice president of sales for Jessup, MD-based Pete Pappas & Sons, Inc., which distributes to customers from New England to North Carolina. “We are able to get to the Boston area within eight to 10 hours and can say the same going south to Charlotte, NC, and Atlanta. This is a good hub in terms of proximity to be able to get to so many metropolitan areas and places where so many people live.”
The population of the region is booming. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, popu- lation in the Washington-Arlington,VA-Al- exandria, VA metropolitan area increased 9 percent from 2010 to 2016. The metro area’s 6.2 million people make it the sixth-largest U.S. metropolitan area. The 2.8 million resi- dents in Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD, metropolitan area constitute the 21st largest metropolitan area. The region experienced a 3.3 percent population increase from 2010 to 2016.
Landover, MD-based Keany Produce & Gourmet began in 1978, distributing produce with one truck to one customer from one man. Kevin Keany, president and founder, characterizes the Washington, DC, and Baltimore area as a growing and sophis- ticated market. “The cliché is this is the most powerful city in the country,” he says. “It’s a very exciting time to be doing business in the Baltimore and Washington area. It’s a very
66 / MAY 2019 / PRODUCE BUSINESS
vibrant time. There’s so much going on.” The nation’s capital region is a produce distribution throwback. Decades after the rise of supermarket distribution centers and businesses offering prepared foods for busy suburbanites, one can still see the places where farmers once brought their wares to
a gathering place at the center of the cities.
PRODUCE MARKET HERITAGE
Centre Market was the heart of Wash- ington produce more than two centuries ago, occupying the ground between the White House and the Capitol Building. This produce hub, near a railroad station and streetcar line, was also crossroads for DC residents who came regularly to look over the wares from nearby farms.
After the venerable Centre was demol- ished in 1931, the capital’s produce, meat and dairy peddlers moved to Union Terminal Market at 4th Street and Florida Avenue NE, close to the Baltimore and Ohio Rail- road Freight Terminal and a major highway to the farms in the outlying areas.
The beginning of the end of central Washington, DC, as a hub connecting the
city’s residents with Mid-Atlantic farmers came in 1962, however, when the city banned the outdoor sale of meats and eggs.
The Union Market still stands in Wash- ington as the facility was renovated after the produce wholesalers moved to the outlying areas. It is now a gourmet food hall.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once proclaimed Baltimore “the gastronomic capital of the world.” The city’s Lexington Market has occupied the same location since it opened as one of the country’s first public markets in 1782. In the early 1900s, the downtown market housed more than 1,000 food vendors. It still benefits from a reputation for foods one might not find elsewhere. Most of the vendors at the modern-day Lexington Market’s 80 stalls offer prepared foods. Three stalls sell produce.
For many of the neighbors there are few, if any, other places to buy fresh fruits and vegetables than Lexington Market. “Many of our local regular customers are getting to the market by public transportation from areas that are or have been defined as ‘high priority food areas’, or areas that do not have easy access to fresh and healthy food options,” says
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