reasons for buying local: status or values?

Although a little dated (it's from last summer), I just ran across an article in the NYTimes about a guy in San Francisco who started a company that will till, plant, and harvest a garden in the backyard of city-dwellers who want local food but don't want to get their shiny new jeans dirty. Apparently this is a growing trend of business start-ups, tending to the locavore needs of people with means:

Or you could just have your private chef handle all your local food needs. At their Hamptons summer house, John and Lorna Brett Howard want to eat almost exclusively local, which means that in place of one trip to the grocery store, their chef, Michael Welch, makes several trips to farm stands and the fishmonger. 

“What I’m seeing with my clients is not the trendiness or the politics,” Mr. Welch said. “They are looking only at taste.”

I can't help but wonder how right Mr. Welch is about that trendiness statement. After reading a column written by our own Joel Lovell about the Greenmarket in Brooklyn, and this level of self-righteousness he can't help but feel radiating from the fat wallets of its customers--that just because you have the money to pay $28 per pound of biodynamic grass-fed steak does not mean you are a better person--I really think trend has got to have an active role in this situation. The same way some people start shopping at J. Crew and Banana Republic when they start making money; not really because the clothes mean anything more to them deep down, but because they represent some level of "making it".

But, this is the thing: I shop farmer's markets and I've never experienced this feeling. I mean, they're just stands set up in a parking lot--about as modest as you can get. Most of the people shopping don't look rich to me. If anything, most people are toting bike helmets or bandanas and Birkenstocks. And the food isn't any more expensive. I could get a basket of 5 or 6 apples for 3 or 4 bucks, a head of romaine for $1.50; all in all I spent less at farmer's markets than I would have at jacked-up Giant Eagle or (even worse) Whole Foods.(Maybe these economic and social differences are attributable to differences in cites--I mean, Pittsburgh is not New York.)

And I guess now would be the time to mention that I do not shop at Whole Foods, which Joel mentioned along with the Greenmarket. I went there once with my mom and sister to find gluten-free pizza dough for her, and my eyes nearly bugged out of my head when I saw the price for just about every single thing in there. We left and went to Trader Joe's instead and found that, while a smaller store, they had a lot of the same lovely atypical and organic foods, but without the fancy labels and price tags. (Their produce is not local, but that's why I go to farmer's markets.) The employees dress in Hawaiin shirts, some have piercings and combat boots and jet-black hair, some are about as typical blond crew-cut American as you can get. And while I do see a few Mercedes roll into the parking lot, the clientèle is a diverse mix, and most look middle class. It's just super laid back.

So I guess maybe these self-righteous feelings arise not from the act of buying local or organic foods, but the motives for buying it and how much it costs. If you do it just because it's associated with a status of comfort--having the money not just to feed your family, but to feed your family the best of the best--or because a bunch of your cool friends are doing it, I can understand holier-than-thou concerns. But it's a little different for me. My friends generally do not shop at the places I do, so I go by myself. Actually, I've been teased for eating "weird foods" (lovingly, I'm sure,) so it's sort of been an anti-trend for me. And I do go to satisfy a certain taste for fresh, healthy foods, but it also has to do with peace of mind; doing what little I can to support a type of system that I feel better about than corporate agribusiness. And the peace of mind I get from knowing a little more about the food I eat; what's in it, where it came from. It's not really more expensive, but it does take extra travel and planning, so I guess it's a tiny bit of a commitment. It's personal, it's political, but mainly it's about values.