The Lansdale Farmers' Market, in many ways, is just like the crops its vendors sell from their stands and trucks each season.

It began with a seed. In this case, an idea was planted in Lansdale Borough by a group of neighborhood residents, councilmembers and businessowners, such as Tabora Farms owner Caleb Torrice, Renew Community Church Pastor J.R. Briggs and Molly Whetstone. In five years, the idea grew into a strong group of volunteers and fiscal agents. It branched off to influence vendors from Telford, Doylestown and beyond. The market lived and thrived and survived due to Saturday shoppers on Railroad Avenue.

Now, the Lansdale Farmers' Market enters the 2013 season Saturday with its roots firmly planted in the ground—it has received nonprofit 501(c)(3) status. "We want to make decisions for ourselves and stand on our own two feet as an organization," Whetstone said.

Lansdale Farmers' Market now has a board of directors: Whetstone as president, Torrice as vice president and head of vendor relations, realtor Carol Bailey Zellers as treasurer and Lansdale Democratic Committeeman Rege McKenzie as secretary. They all wrote their own bylaws and articles of incorporation themselves, Whetstone said, sans attorney and with teamwork. "We've been at it for long enough, that it is one of our longtime goals to become something. For four years, we were just group of volunteers, and we operated to the generosity of a fiscal agent like Manna or food trusts," Whetstone said. "Because they were formal organizations and we were not, they could purchase insurance for us and handle our finances and accounting."

"It was just a matter of time and organizational capacity in place to do that," she said.

The group of volunteers put together the formal filing to become a registered corporation in Pennsylvania, and also filed with the federal government to get the nonprofit 501(c)(3) status.

"That was big deal for us," Whetstone said. "We were just a group of volunteers doing this nice thing for such a long time, and we wanted to continue it in a sustainable way." The Lansdale Farmers' Market will be tended by new market manager Charisse McGill, a high school hospitality management instructor. Part-timer McGill will lead fundraising efforts and vendor relations.