Global Food and Art Market in Spokane

The Gathering House in Spokane, Washington is using an empty parking lot to help connect immigrant and refugee business owners with the community by hosting a global food and art market. By sharing their products the business owners are able to develop and promote their businesses while sharing their stories.

Here is an note as well from Rob Bryceson, pastor of the Gathering House with an update about their community following the devastating wildfires in August:

We want to thank all of you for your prayers and encouragement during the fires here in August in Spokane. At the Gathering House we had many people evacuated. One of our leadership team members lost his home and his story of rescue and moving forward has some miraculous moments. I’m proud to say not one single person connected with our church evacuated to a hotel or shelter. Other church members opened their doors and their hearts and took them in! We didn’t even need to collect food, clothing, or other items because all of Spokane rallied with donations and support.

The local city poured out so much help that rescue centers had to put up signs saying donations no longer needed or accepted. Three million dollars was raised by the local business community in less than two weeks and poured into a reputable grant agency.

The evacuees have all returned home to those houses still standing. Although Gathering House attendees fared well, all of us can name at least one friend or associate who lost their home. The coming months will show how the city will unite and stay strong. Already there are coalitions of churches uniting to create long term crisis response organizations. We thank all of you for your prayers and willingness to support us as we emerge from this tragedy.

Pastor Rob Bryceson
The Gathering House

You can find out more and follow the Global Food and Art Market on Instagram or Facebook. You can also email Joanna at globalfoodandartmarket@gmail.com.

Transcript

Erik Cave:
Hello, everyone. Erik Cave here from the Pacific Northwest Conference, your Director of NextGen Ministries. Today, I'm excited to introduce you to Joanna Newcomb. She is a member of the Gathering House Church in Spokane, Washington, and she's the coordinator for their Global Food and Art Market.

Joanna, welcome! I'm excited for you to tell us about the Food and Art Market. But first, please take a moment to introduce yourself and tell us how you got connected with Gathering House.

Joanna Newcomb:
Yeah, thank you so much. It was around 2015 when I was working as a food writer. At that time, Gathering House had a café ministry. I did a story about them, and that's how I heard about the church. I loved what they were doing, so I ended up going to that church, met my husband there, and we've been there ever since.

Erik Cave:
That is a really fun connection! What did you write about? I'm just curious.

Joanna Newcomb:
I was writing about the ministry they were doing in the café. They were hiring people who were coming out of difficult situations, so it was really a ministry. They also had really good food, so I was writing about their delicious sandwiches and the mission they were doing.

Erik Cave:
That's great. And that fostered your connection to the church. Wonderful.

So, that eventually led to you becoming the coordinator for their Global Food and Art Market. Tell us, what is this all about, and what are you hoping to accomplish through the market?

Joanna Newcomb:
The Global Food and Art Market is an outdoor vendor market, kind of like a farmers’ market, but a little bit different. We're in an area called the Garland District, which is a nice little street of businesses and a movie theater. It's a great place where people like to hang out. There used to be a market in that area, in our parking lot, but it stopped. When that happened, we prayed about what God might have us do with the parking lot and what kind of mission we could do with a market. He led us to create a market for refugee and immigrant business owners. Our mission is really to support refugee- and immigrant-owned businesses in our area and give them a place to start their businesses if they're new to entrepreneurship, or to grow their existing businesses.

At the same time, we want to have a place where we can celebrate culture and celebrate people from different places around the world. We want to give people in Spokane a place to meet them face-to-face and learn about their cultures.

Erik Cave:
That sounds fantastic. So, you gather vendors for the market. Where do they come from? Tell us about the folks you're working with.

Joanna Newcomb:
They're from several different countries. We have vendors from Iraq, Syria, El Salvador, Venezuela, Ukraine, and many others. A lot of them we connected with through local immigrant and refugee organizations, such as World Relief, Refugee & Immigrant Connection Spokane, and Manzanita House. Most of them were former clients who came through some of the refugee programs. Those organizations participate with us as well. They'll set up a booth at the market to share information about their work with the people who are there.

Erik Cave:
Oh wow, that sounds wonderful. So, I imagine this requires a lot of support. How are you funding this? How are you getting the support to make this happen?

Joanna Newcomb:
Similar to how farmers markets do it, we got some sponsorships from local businesses, basically by meeting with them and asking if they would like to support us. We also received support from local banks. We started the market last year, so this year was our second year. And this year, we received a grant from the City of Spokane to do the market.

Erik Cave:
Wow, that's great. Can you share with us some stories that you've heard from some of the vendors' experiences, or even from people in the community? Whatever stories come to mind.

Joanna Newcomb:
Yeah. One of our vendors last year shared that, at this time in our society and our country, she had been experiencing some negativity and hostility out in public. The market, to her, felt like a safe place—a place where she received a lot of kindness. That was so amazing to hear. We also have a vendor who's from Afghanistan. She's going to school for business, and she wanted to start her own business. She got connected with us through Manzanita House. She does a lot of different things. She's selling jewelry, and she's also working on starting a food business. She's really passionate, and her heart is also to help women from her culture be able to work outside the home and receive an education. At her booth, she's selling some of her items and also partnering with a friend who sews. So, she's helping her friend with her business as well, which is really cool.

We're also doing a program where we help vendors who are getting their business license for the first time. We offer to pay for the license for the artists because we know that can be a barrier to getting started. We want to do more than just offer them a space. We also want to give them a boost in those beginning stages of getting their businesses going.

Erik Cave:
Wow. Good job! Those are some amazing stories. I know the current season has wrapped up for the summer, right? How many weeks did it run?

Joanna Newcomb:
It was 13 weeks.

Erik Cave:
Thirteen weeks, from spring into August or something like that?

Joanna Newcomb:
Yeah, from May through July.

Erik Cave:
May through July. Okay. I was off a little bit there. You've now wrapped up two seasons of this. What are you thinking for the future?

Joanna Newcomb:
For the future, we like to talk to our vendors at the end of the season to get their feedback—to see what was helpful and how it went for them. Then we kind of go from there and evaluate how we want to do it next year. We also evaluate the support that we have from the community to see what direction we'll go in, whether it's the same thing next year or a slightly different approach. We just pray about it and see how God wants to continue to lead this.

Erik Cave:
Good. So, if folks who are watching from some of our Covenant churches around the region would like to find out more about what you've done, or if they would like to support you in some way, how could they do so?

Joanna Newcomb:
They could email me, and they could also go on social media. We have a Facebook page and an Instagram page called Global Food and Art Market. They can see lots of pictures of what's going on, and they can also message me there.

Erik Cave:
Okay. I'll make sure to include links to your email and those platforms in the blog post underneath this video. Joanna, you're doing a great job—or you've done a great job—and I'm excited about the impact you've made on the community there and about the future of this project. Thank you so much for taking the time today to share about it with all of us.

Joanna Newcomb:
Thank you.