Just The FAQs

Thank you for supporting the SWOOM Farmers Market at Atwood Community Gardens as well as The NEXT Steps Youth Entrepreneur Program.
We created this page to answer any questions you may have. Should you have questions that are not answered here, please contact
Debra Robinson at swoomatlanta@gmail.com or Dana Jewel Harris at djharris@nextstepsyep.org to get them answered.

Here are some frequently asked questions:

And here are some answers:

Are there membership fees?


Yes! SWOOM Atlanta asks you to become a member of Friends of Atwood Community Gardens ($5 Annual Donation) to help us provide farm tours, year-round educational programs for at-risk youth, special events and seed monies for our start-up youth ventures and research projects. Your membership fee will provide values that range up to 50% discounts on ticket sales and other items, activities and events we offer through the SWOOM Farmer’s Market and The NEXT Steps Youth Entrepreneur Program. This includes first invitations and announcements to upcoming activities and events affiliated with the:

  • SWOOM Market Project
  • Herb & Farm Summer Internship Program
  • CSI Unit: Community, Science & Innovation Investigation Teams
  • 2012 Youth Culinary Tour
  • Atwood Community Gardens & Urban Farm
  • Outdoor Nation: Atlanta Campus Club
  • NEXT Steps Business Training Classes

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How do I order?


Each Sunday evening, a list of available products is sent to all of our registered customers by e-mail. Customers must place their order for the week no later than Tuesday at 5:00 p.m. Orders can be placed here on our website. Ordering through this web site is our preferred method as it is designed to reduce the amount of time it takes us to process orders as well as provide you with detailed information about our products.

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Will I have to buy vegetables I don't want?


NEVER! Unlike some co-ops, buying clubs, or CSAs where everyone gets the same box of stuff (and you don’t know what you’re getting until you get it), with Locally Grown you get to order what you want, in the quantities that you want, from the farms that you want. The weekly email lists the produce, milled products, fresh flowers, and artisan goods available that week, and you can browse the items on this website before you place your order.

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So there's no minimum order amount?


No. Order as much or as little as you want, from the farms and providers that you want.

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How and when do I pay?


We take payment in several ways:

1. You can pay into your account in advance (via check or cash in person, or online via Credit/Debit card), and draw down over time. (Extremely convenient!)
2. Pay via credit/debit card online when you place your order. We support all Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, JCB, and Diners Club cards. If you pay via card, a 3% admin fee will be added to your order to help cover processing costs.
3. Pay via cash, check, credit/debit card, or EBT/SNAP when you pick up your order. (We also offer the Wholesome Wave token program.)

NOTE: If you fail to pick up your order by the close of market operations, your payment will be treated as a donation to The NEXT Steps Youth Entrepreneur Program. A donation receipt will be provided to you during the next business day and your order will be given to a needy family or taken to the Atlanta Community Food Bank.

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Are there taxes or other charges added to my order?


The growers set their own prices, and are all-inclusive, including any taxes (like gasoline at the gas station, or food at the airport). Since the growers are selling directly to you, they (not SWOOM or NEXT Steps) are responsible for collecting and reporting sales and other taxes.

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When and where do I pick up my order?


From 4:30 until 8:00 p.m. on Thursdays, customers can pick-up their produce at Atwood Community Gardens & Urban Farm located at 779 Atwood Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30310. (Sorry, we DO NOT make deliveries.) It lies in the heart of West End Atlanta (near the Atlanta University Center, Morehouse & Spelman Colleges).

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Oh no! I forgot to pickup my order! Now what?


We’re sorry we missed you! About a half hour before we pack up to go home, we’ll call you if you haven’t come yet, using the phone number you tied to your account. Most times, we get an answering machine, so if we haven’t reached you when it’s time to go, we’ll try again. If we still haven’t been able to reach you, your items will be donated to a needy family in the Westview Food Desert Community or given to the Atlanta Community Food Bank!

We do not have a means to keep items until the next week, or to deliver them to you. If we are able to reach you on the phone, we may be able to work out an arrangement, but otherwise, your items will be donated or given away!

Since the growers harvested just for you, and (more importantly) since we paid the growers on your behalf when they brought them to our market, you are still responsible for paying for items, even if you do not pick them up. We’ll charge your account, and that amount will get added to your next order.

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Why Support Locally Grown?


Enhance your local economy: By purchasing produce and other items from local growers you are providing stability to your local economy through the support of local businesses.

Save natural resources: Buying locally makes you an invaluable link in the process of saving resources such as fossil fuels and packaging materials. Also, we are right here in your community so the expense of transportation and delivery is kept to a minimum.

Provide learning opportunities: Locally Grown supporters provide member growers the means to help educate our community about the importance of sustainable agriculture.

Supporting a way of life: The number of small farms in the United States has decreased dramatically in the last decade. Please help us preserve an honest and worthy means of making a living.

We believe that small, diverse, family-owned farms contribute to society’s overall health.

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Why are some of your products labelled "organic" and others are not?


First off, no “conventional” growers are allowed to sell through our market. Everything sold here is grown without the use of synthetic fertilizers, herbicides, or pesticides. Everything here could be sold as “organic”, but many growers choose not to. To use the word “organic”, a grower must register through the USDA and keep up with a tremendous amount of paperwork. The process is very expensive and intensive, and certainly favors the larger factory farms over the small family farm. The state of Georgia has seen that, and has given the small producer who sells only a few thousand dollars a year of produce a means to register with the state department of agriculture. A few of our growers have gone that route, and they can legally use the word “organic” in Georgia.

Another system is “Certified Naturally Grown”. This nation-wide program seeks to correct the problems with the USDA certification system. The standards are just as strict (and in some cases, more so) as the USDA Organic program, but there is no cost to become certified. There is still some paperwork, but not as much. More importantly, the growers in the program inspect each other, rather than relying on an outside for-profit certifier. Several of our growers have gone this route.

Finally, a few growers are not certified by anyone but still use organic sustainable methods on their farms.

To find out more about our growers, and to see what certification, if any, they have, take a look at our Growers page.

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How do I become a grower with SWOOM?


All vendors and growers must complete and sign the SWOOM Vendor Agreement to participate in the 2012 market season. Our market fee is $20 for the season. Included in the fee is inclusion in the online market.

Each week we post the items available from vendors on the site. Customers purchase from the site and pick up their items at the weekly market located at Atwood Community Gardens & Urban Farm, 779 Atwood Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30010. The online market is an added benefit to help increase your produce and product sales.

The information we need from you is your:

  • garden/farm name
  • farm manager name
  • phone number that will be answered immediately
  • mailing address
  • garden/farm address
  • website
  • Distance of farm from market
  • If you’re Certified Organic or Certified Naturally Grown

**If you plan on selling products from any other producer, that producer also needs to fill out the appropriate application and be approved by SWOOM.

You will need to supply us with a weekly list of the fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers that you would like to sell. You are not committed to carry items that you list.

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