Booths at Cape Coral Farmer’s Market destroyed by Ida’s outer bands

As Hurricane Ida made its way past Southwest Florida on Saturday, it still left behind some damage.

More than 60 vendor booths at the Cape Coral Farmer’s Market were destroyed. Some business owners say this is the worst damage they’ve ever seen.

While vendors have managed to clean up some of what Hurricane Ida’s outer bands left behind, the entire mess is far from being taken care of. What started out as a beautiful day turned ugly very quickly.

Michael Wallace is with Pine Island Botannicals. “It was like, oh, yeah, we have a weather situation coming,” Wallace said.

Claudia St. Onge is a business manager who works with the Cape Coral Chamber of Commerce. “The sky got pitch black, and within minutes, that rain came sideways. The wind caused damage to a market, not the rain,” said St. Onge.

St. Onge has been the buisness manager with the chamber of commerce for 25 years but says she’s never seen anything like this. “Nothing like this. Nothing like this,” she said.

According to St. Onge, almost 60 vendors had their booths and every bit of their small business that they bring to the Cape Coral Farmer’s Market destroyed on Saturday.

Elizabeth Coquillard is with Southwest Florida Produce. “It literally came right through the market. In and out in a matter of four minutes and it was destroyed,” Coquillard said.

Coquillard says Southwest Florida Produce has been at the Cape Coral Farmer’s Market every Saturday for 20 years. And, much like St. Onge, she’s never seen this much damage either. She and another vendor agree that repairs will be expensive.

“People lost literally hundreds of dollars of their product,” said Wallace.

“We just all need to come together as a community and hopefully get them new tents and new tables and can get them back up and going next week,” Coquillard said. “So they don’t just totally lose out on their whole business.”

With enough support, the hope is that those who have had their small businesses destroyed will be able to bounce back.

St. Onge says the plan is to restart the farmer’s market next Saturday, even if that means fewer vendors. They say that since the community has been supporting them for 25 years, they can do the same.