the 'lower customer densities' twist is interesting. I wonder what creates that situation. Maybe people want to rush their purchases when in a crowd?
Anecdotally, that does align with my experience. I tend to try to shop off hours, but now stores try to cram soo much into their brick 'n mortar footprint that even light foot traffic is a claustrophobic experience.
For me, the inability to freely navigate a crowded store and the short mean time between interruption (where you have to move because someone else wants to get by or look at the same thing), curb my desire to linger and peruse. I make my plan, I get in, I get out. And that's only when I can't order for pickup/delivery to avoid navigating the store entirely.
If the place is crowded then shopping is annoying and hard, and my impulse says to get the things I need and leave. I'm more likely to leave without things I need (eh, do I really want to trudge back across the store for milk or can I just deal with black coffee?)
+ after having a chat you feel guilty not actually buying anything...
I know when I'm in a crowded environment I spend much less time browsing and just grab the stuff I need and get out the way. This sort of feels intuitive to me.
If your local farmers market is convenient to get to, maybe you go there for small orders, and if it's convenient for you, it's likely convenient for many. If your local market is hard to get to, you probably don't go as often, but when you do, you get more stuff.
If the market is near dense residential, it probably gets more customer density and more small orders; if it's out in the sticks, it probably gets less customer density and larger orders. You're not driving 30 minutes round trip to get one pepper that you need right now, but you might walk a 5 minute round trip for that.
I'd expect a business to have a PO or at least a company card/checkbook, want very specific things (vs. whatever you can get from Sysco), and to purchase early/late because their business hours overlap.
Another interesting question: Are people buying more food with this vendor now, thus displacing future purchases, or is the extra food ending up going to waste?
I could imagine vendors at a farmer’s market could easily run into a bottleneck of not being able to service customers fast enough.