Starting a business is an exciting, albeit slightly slow process.  As much as I wish I could spend all my time recipe testing (and eating….), the most important thing right now is to make sure I have all the proper paperwork completed.  My goal this week was to make sure I had all the necessary paperwork done to be able to sell at the Farmer’s Market this summer.  I love going to Farmer’s Markets and believe it’s one of the best ways for local businesses to get their name out in the community.  It’s like having your own mini-store front each week minus all the costs of actually having a store-front.

The first thing I had to do was talk to the Health Department, who will most likely become my new BFF after this whole process is done.  Like anyone else, I want to make sure what I’m doing is legal, so the Health Department and I will be talking a lot over the next couple months…….I should probably put them in my phone as a favorite now – do you think my boyfriend would be mad if I bumped him from the number one spot in my phone????  Okay, I’m getting off topic – back to my story.  It turns out I’m highly restricted as to the items I can sell at the Farmer’s Market.  At first, I was kind of bummed to hear that a lot of the things I wanted to sell (like Whoopie Pies….sorry guys!) are on the restricted list.  But then I realized this was an awesome opportunity for me to get creative and branch out a bit.  I’ll be writing a post on all this soon, cause I would love to get your input and hear some of your ideas!

Once I got everything squared away with the Health Department, the next step was to make sure I could reserve a booth at the market.  We have two different ones here in Bozeman, a large one on Saturday and a smaller one on Tuesday nights.  My favorite of these is the Tuesday one.  It’s outdoors in a great park and since it’s smaller, my booth will hopefully have a better chance of being noticed and not get lost in the shuffle.  I heard back from the directors of the Tuesday market yesterday and I have some exciting news to share.  Starting June 4, you will be able to buy The Earnest Baker’s products at the Bogert Farmer’s Market!!  It’s a small step, but I could not be more stoked and have had a huge smile on my face ever since I got the confirmation.  I now know for sure that I have a venue to sell my products at and that is huge for me.  I cannot wait to join the awesome community of local market vendors and hope to see all you guys there!

On a side note, if anyone was wondering – the title of this post is a reference to the super awesome Bill Murray movie What About Bob.  If you haven’t seen it yet, you should seriously rent and watch it now…..you can thank me later.