Foothills Farmers’ Market links Cleveland County growers to local shoppers

At the Bobby Bell Pavilion in uptown Shelby, Foothills Farmers’ Market works as more than a Saturday shopping stop. Cleveland County says the market supports 75-plus vendors, and the products sold there travel an average of 12 miles to reach the Shelby City Pavilion, with everything raised or grown within 50 miles of Cleveland County.

A county market built to move local food

Foothills Farmers’ Market traces its start to 2008, when farmers and local food advocates built it through a grassroots push connected to N.C. Cooperative Extension’s Local Food Program. The market later formalized that work by incorporating as a charitable nonprofit on May 3, 2010. Its own policies say it began under tents on busy Washington Street in uptown Shelby, then grew with enough vendors, products and customers to become a cornerstone of Cleveland County’s local-food movement.

That history matters because the market now functions as infrastructure. It gives small and mid-size farms a place to sell directly, rather than sending crops through wholesale channels that strip out much of the margin. It also keeps spending local, supports downtown foot traffic in Uptown Shelby and gives Cleveland County a defined place where local food is not a slogan but a weekly operating system.

How the market is governed and where it operates

The market is governed by a 15-member board, made up of 12 community representatives and 3 vendor representatives. That structure makes it a community-led institution, not just a retail venue, and it helps explain why the market’s public mission reaches beyond produce tables.

For shoppers, the main year-round market runs Saturdays from 8 a.m. to noon at the Bobby Bell Pavilion in uptown Shelby. Cleveland County’s community materials tie the market to the Shelby City Pavilion, and the market’s year-round footprint makes it one of the most reliable places in the county to buy food that stayed close to home. Foothills defines “locally grown or produced” as food whose production, harvesting, processing, preparation and packaging all happen within 50 miles of Cleveland County, which gives the word local a strict geographic boundary.

What shoppers can reliably find

The market’s product mix changes with the season, but the core promise is consistent: food raised or grown nearby. The county’s description makes fresh local foods the centerpiece, and the market’s stated purpose includes getting more fruits and vegetables into regular circulation while keeping the supply chain short.

That matters for buyers who want predictable access to nearby food sources and for farmers who need direct retail sales to stay viable. Instead of sending every crop into a larger regional channel, growers can sell what they harvest into a market that already sits inside the county’s own food economy. The average 12-mile trip from farm to market underscores how close that supply chain really is.

Why vendors use it as a business platform

Foothills is not just serving farmers who bring produce for a few weekend sales. A 2024 Impact Report cited by Extension found more than 50 vendors sold regularly at the year-round market, and the market also partnered with Shelby VFW to operate a shared commercial kitchen used by five value-added food producers. That arrangement matters for small processors and home-based entrepreneurs who need kitchen access before they can turn ingredients into jams, baked goods, sauces or other packaged foods.

The market’s own goals make the business case explicit: create opportunities for small and mid-size family farms, foster entrepreneurship for home-based business owners and youth, and enhance tourism and retail trade in Uptown Shelby. Those are economic development goals as much as food goals, and they show how the market helps farmers keep more of the consumer dollar while giving downtown Shelby a steady weekly draw.

Food access, youth education and the public-health side

Foothills has accepted SNAP and FNS benefits for about 10 years, which places low-income shoppers inside the same local-food network as everyone else. But the usage numbers show how access and participation are not the same thing: from January through June 2024, the market averaged 3.8 SNAP or FNS transactions per month.

That gap is part of the story too. It points to the challenge of turning eligibility into routine use, even at a market that says it is designed to reduce hunger and food insecurity. The market also runs a Power of Produce Kids’ Club that gives children a free food-related learning activity every Saturday morning, tying the market’s public-health mission to early food education and family attendance.

Kings Mountain is becoming part of the same system

The market’s reach is no longer confined to Uptown Shelby. On January 21, 2025, Cleveland County commissioners approved the purchase of a permanent market location at 313 S. Battleground Ave. in Kings Mountain, and the county has said the long-term plan is to build a pavilion there similar to the one in Shelby so the market can operate Saturday mornings year-round. That move turns Kings Mountain into a second anchor for the same local-food network rather than a separate project.

Taken together, Foothills Farmers’ Market is doing several jobs at once: it gives growers a direct sales channel, gives small food businesses a path into licensed production, gives families access to local food and SNAP-supported shopping, and gives both Shelby and Kings Mountain a reason to pull people downtown. In Cleveland County, that is not simply a market schedule. It is a countywide food system in weekly use.