Concord Rotary Farmers Market

More than $750,000 has been raised for charity by the Rotary Club of Concord through this market, which is a striking figure for an operation that runs two Sunday mornings a month out of a suburban car park. Stall fees, public donations and the takings from the Rotary barbecue all go into projects the club supports, mostly local but reaching national and international causes as well.

Two Sundays a month in a car park

The market sets up in the Cintra Park car park off Crane Street, near Concord High School, on the first and third Sunday of each month from 8.30am to 12.30pm. January is the one month off. The line-up is a working farmers market rather than a craft market: fresh fruit and vegetables, meats, honey, olive oils, cheese, freshly baked breads and sweets, plants and coffee.

Nobody on site is paid. The market is owned and operated by volunteer members of Concord Rotary, with help from several other local service groups, which is why the barbecue is staffed by people in Rotary shirts and why the bacon and egg roll has become as much a fixture as the produce. It is a model plenty of Sydney suburbs have tried; sustaining it across two Sundays a month for long enough to clear three quarters of a million dollars is the harder part.

Practical notes for a first visit

Get the date right before you leave home. Two Sundays a month with a January break means roughly 22 market days a year, and turning up on a second or fourth Sunday is the easiest mistake to make. Parking is the market's quiet advantage, since it occupies a car park with more surrounding street parking than most inner-west markets can offer, so the drive-in shop that is impractical at Marrickville or Orange Grove works fine here.

Bring bags for produce and come earlier rather than later if you want a full selection from the growers. The 12.30pm finish is firm, and stallholders with a good morning will start packing before it.