Today we’d like to introduce you to Todd Mason.
Hi Todd, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I first fell in love with the Market in 1975 when my family moved to Houston, and my parents took me out there. I had never seen sugar cane before, or cinnamon sticks, or pumpkins that size. I continued to follow the Market over the years and began thinking about a potential redevelopment during some work I was doing for METRO in 2004 trying to create public/private transit centers for the train and realized the Markets in most cities were generally located near major transit centers. We weren’t able to accomplish that in Houston, but the idea of redeveloping the Market captured my imagination. I continued to follow the ownership and the continued decline of the Houston Farmers Market and began travelling to markets around the world to study them and think about what could be done with the one in Houston.
In 2015, I realized the leadership of the Houston Farmers Market was beginning to change and there might be an opportunity to buy it and redevelop it, so we focused on getting a meeting with the Board of Directors. That took until mid-2016 to have a meeting in person and a serious conversation about purchasing the property. It took us almost another year to acquire The Houston Farmers Marketing Association Inc from the 104 shareholders in the corporation, but we managed to close the deal in May of 2017 and have been working on the redevelopment since that time.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The challenges nearly drowned us a few times. We purchased the property in May 2017 and Hurricane Harvey occurred 3 months later in August of 2017. This caused the City of Houston to re-evaluate all the flood water designs in the region and a 12-month delay while they created an entirely new set of rules regarding detention and drainage for all developments. The new rules forced us into an entirely new design, 18 months behind our original schedule, plus an additional $4,000,000 in unanticipated design and construction costs. We finished our plans and received our first set of permits around August 2019 and were excited to get started with construction of our redevelopment, but the worst was yet to come.
In February 2020, we first heard of some strange virus (COVID 19), which once again changed everything. The process slowed and prices on all construction materials and labor rose. After many pivots, we managed to get the main pavilion open and the open-air tenants moved in in March of 2021. Our butcher shop (RC Ranch) and the burger shop (Underbelly Burger) opened before the end of 2021. We hope to be fully occupied and stabilized by mid to late 2023, which will be about 2.5 years behind our original schedule, but considering the headwinds we faced, we feel fortunate to be able to complete it at all.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
The history of the Market is attached, and I am just glad the Farmers who started this in 1942 and those who have shepherded it since that time were able to preserve this true gem for the City of Houston. We are honored to have been selected to move it forward to its next evolution and hope it remains a gem for this City for many decades to come.
Contact information:
- Website: https://thehoustonfarmersmarket.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/houstonfarmersmarket/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheHoustonFarmersMkt/
Image Credits
Houston Farmers Market
