Jefferson Street hosts Community-Wide Market Saturday

Published 8:34 am Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Looking for fine arts? What about hand-made crafts? What if you just want to browse antiques, or knives or even Amish food?

The United Methodist Women of Jefferson Street United Methodist Church have you covered.

The annual Community Wide Market at Jefferson Street UMC will be from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. The funds raised are used to benefit local, state and international missions.

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The event functions essentially as a flea market inside the church’s family life center and in its parking lot, and this year so far 47 booths have been rented.

“The vendors are coming from everywhere,” said Millicent Mayo, who is co-chairing the event along with Brenda Williams.

“All the booths that are outside, people get to know each other,” Mayo said. “Inside is full of people who have booths, and everybody has a really, really good time, and I have run into more and more people who can’t wait to shop, so I am really excited about it.”

The two missions based in Natchez that this year’s market will support are the Stewpot and Habitat for Humanity.

Other causes that the funds will help around the state include the Bethlehem Center, Wesley House, Camp Wesley Pines, Christmas shoeboxes and the Choctaw mission, among others.

The group also supports the work of a medical professional who travels to Liberia every few years, Mayo said.

The UMW gets its proceeds from the vendors’ booth rent and the sale of concessions, Mayo said.

Concessions will include homemade hamburgers for $4, coffee and other drinks.

The group did its first Community Wide Market in 2013, Mayo said, instead of having a church garage sale because they wanted to try something new.

Since then, it has grown from the initial 19 booths to this year’s 47.

Booth space is still available.

The cost for a booth is $40 inside and $30 outside. Electricity costs an additional $5.

Those who want to join in can contact Mayo at 601-807-8705.

“We sell everything from trash to treasure, and people can come and bring whatever they want to sell,” she said.

Booth recruiting for this year included Mayo — who works in the antique business — reaching out to other vendors she knows, as well as spreading the word through nearly two dozen buy, sell and trade groups in the Internet.

“A lot of vendors cannot wait to get here to buy,” she said. “People who are going to have a garage sale at their house, it is better to bring it here to us because we have all the people who are coming in.”