Ann Arbor voters have demonstrated over and over again a community-wide commitment to becoming a totally ecologically sustainable city with a focus on reducing garbage waste and transitioning from fossil fuels to green power sources. But let’s not forget that where and how we feed ourselves is a massively important part of achieving a circular economy and genuinely sustainable living; especially since the 2026 Ann Arbor Local Food Festival will be coming on August 27.
“The City of Ann Arbor’s A2ZERO plan includes a goal specifically to support residents in transitioning to a more plant-rich diet. We are in the process of identifying metrics and data points that can help us get a better picture of exactly where the city stands in how sustainable our diets actually are [from] a climate perspective,” Azella Markgraf, the food sustainability officer for the City of Ann Arbor, said. While she acknowledges that Ann Arbor is still finding its feet in getting to a circular, totally sustainable food supply system, the festival itself is “a celebration of Michigan food and farming.”
Attendance will be free, and there will be lots of free things to do, but quite a lot of what is available will cost money. It will go from 5-8pm.
Chef demonstrations, crafts tables for kids and live music make this a favorite event for foodies, families looking to get out of the house and get food while meeting friends or finding new friends. There will also be a series of games and information about the ecological sustainability of eating local.
About ten percent of America’s greenhouse gas emissions comes from crop production and animal husbandry, and about a quarter of emissions globally. The closer you live to the food that you eat, the lower your food carbon footprint is; making eating local both the ecologically responsible choice and the choice that is best to keep your local economy healthy, often bypassing corporate food silos. Washtenaw County is also an unusually healthy county for family farms. After reaching a peak of nearly seven million about the time that the Great Depression hit, the number of family farms has been falling steadily ever since to there being just 1.88 million nationally in 2024, according to the Economic Research Service of the United States Department of Agriculture.
This is the fifth year of the festival. It is a collaboration between the City of Ann Arbor’s Office of Sustainability and Innovations, the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market and Argus Farm Stop – a local grocery store alternative that is a hybrid between a farmer’s markets and suburban-style grocery store.
“We’ve been growing mostly because we have learned that the date matters – learning earlier in the season, and earlier in the evening,” Kathy Sample, the co-owner of Argus, said. The festival takes place during harvest season of course, so the farmers who show up for the festival are what Sample describes as “the farmers who want to go above and beyond in being more visible in the community.”
Washtenaw County is fairly unique for small farms actually. Although the Farm Bureau found that there was a 46% increase in farms filing for Chapter 12 bankruptcy from 2024 to 2025 throughout the country, that isn’t the case here. Despite the Midwest having the most bankruptcies, Ann Arbor has seen a renaissance of small farmers in its surrounding area in the last few years, due in no small part, to the popularity of the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market.
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If the farmers in Washtenaw County are going to survive the tariffs that have cut them off from much of the world’s market, the soaring diesel prices caused by the war in Iran, and the fact that the closing of the Strait of Hormuz has cut off a huge part of the world’s supply of fertilizer, it is going to have to be because of continued support for local food options. The Local Food Festival is a great way to start supporting family owned farms within an hour or two drive of the Diag.
Free produce samples
The not-yet-complete list of farms and food producers are:
- Brines Farm
- Carpenter Farms
- C’mon Betty Kitchen
- Community Farm of Ann Arbor
- Cultured Kombucha Company
- Kapnick Orchards
- Mindo Chocolate Makers
- Old City Acres
- Smiling Jim’s Organic Seasonings
- The Farm at Trinity Health
- The Hungry Locavore
- Vestergaard Farms
- Why Not Pie!
- Wilderness Wildcraft
Food trucks and pop ups
The businesses who have signed up so far are:
- Baan Phadthai
- Craveable Food Trailer
- Impasto Food Truck
- Jamaican Spice Food Truck
- No Label Juice
- Rite Spice Kitchen
- Samosa House
- Simply Spanish Food Truck
- Plant-Based Coneys
Community exhibitors
The growing list for 2026 includes:
- Ann Arbor Farmers Market
- Ann Arbor Meals on Wheels
- Ann Arbor Office of Sustainability and Innovations
- Ann Arbor Senior Center
- Argus Farm Stop
- City of Ann Arbor Department of Public Works – Solid Waste
- City of Ann Arbor Greenbelt
- Echelon Kitchen & Bar
- Fair Food Network
- FedUp Ministries
- Food Gatherers
- Growing Hope
- Huron River Watershed Council
- Leslie Science & Nature Center / Ann Arbor Hands on Museum
- Make Food Not Waste
- Marquee Arts – Michian & State Theaters
- Michigan State University Extension
- National Wild Turkey Federation
- People’s Food Coop
- Taste the Local Difference
- VegMichigan
- Washtenaw Community College Dining Services
- Washtenaw County Conservation District
- Washtenaw County Resiliency Office
Drew Saunders is a freelance business and environmental journalist who grew up just outside of Ann Arbor. He covers local business developments, embraces his foodie side with reviews restaurants, obsesses over Michigan's environmental state, loves movies, and feels spoiled by the music he gets to review for Ann Arbor!
