Port Moody's strict sign bylaw banning advertising for temporary events such as markets and yard sales has led Coquitlam Farmers Market officials to seek some creative ways around the rules.
Most recently, market organizers are considering employing a children's choir and a giant mobile tomato to get the word out.
Coquitlam Farmers Market director Tabitha McLoughlin said the tactics are necessary to skirt the sign bylaw and let people know about this weekend's winter farmers market at the Port Moody rec complex.
"We've been trying to figure out ways to promote the market and we have this tomato costume so the idea was to see if some brave soul would don it and promote us that way," McLoughlin said. "And a local choir group said they could come do a flash mob at the market and then stick around to do some performances."
The bylaw, which prohibits erecting stationary signs aside from those over licensed businesses, is in stark contrast to those in Coquitlam and Port Coquitlam, McLoughlin said, where city staff actually help market organizers post notices for their events.
"We have done a winter market in some form or another in Port Moody at the rec centre for 13 years... and this was the first time that the bylaw was enforced," she said.
McLoughlin, who sits on the board of the BC Farmers' Market Association, said the group recently put forth a recommendation to the B.C. Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services advising B.C. municipalities to help farmers markets advertise their events. That recommendation was accepted by the finance committee, McLoughlin said, because farmers' markets bring measurable benefits to even non-participating businesses.
A PoMo city official wasn't available for comment in time for publication Thursday.
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