Vegetable stand works on the honor system

The Smiths’ produce stand near Marine works on the honor system.

Choose your tomatoes or zucchini, weigh them and put your money in the well-worn metal box.

“There are people who can’t believe it’s on the honor system,” Joyce Smith said. “It works pretty good. When we opened last year, my husband (Mel) noticed the numbers weren’t adding up. (He left a note:) ‘If the numbers don’t add up, we will have to close.’ People left us notes saying, ‘We want you to stay.’ Some put a little extra in, saying ‘Hope it helps.’ For the most part, people have been really honest. They just are.

“I know a lady had been passing through on the way to Chicago who didn’t have quite enough. She planned on sending money back. Two years later, it dawned on her. We got the money. She did remember eventually. You know how much it was? Two dollars.

“Somebody bought six pounds of tomatoes at $1.50 a pound and left a twenty-dollar bill.”

The produce is aboard a trailer — the Smiths sell trailers, too. Tomatoes, watermelon, zucchini, cucumbers, peppers and onions awaited customers on a recent morning. Handmade signs let folks know what’s what: “Ugly and spotted” tomatoes were 75 cents a pound. And there’s a “look” lettered on each side of the self-serve. Down-home charm.

“It’s been here since the ’80s,” Joyce Smith said about the trailer that sits near Illinois 4 between a quarter mile and a half mile north of Interstate 70. “That was before I came here.”

She and husband Mel keep the cart stocked with their produce when they can. Sometimes, the weather doesn’t cooperate.

“The green peppers aren’t coming on like they should,” she said. “We lost a whole row. The creek in back of the house flooded and wiped them out. It also got some of our tomatoes. ... All this rain rotted the yellow squash out.”

Before the Smiths’ tomatoes ripened, they were selling Arkansas tomatoes they bought from the market in St. Louis. Sometimes, they sell produce from local farmers.

“They’re having the same problem we are: too much rain,” said Joyce. “You can’t get the fields to plant or harvest. ... We have 1,800 tomato plants. Once we start having ours, people will notice the difference. I just put two of our tomatoes out there. And all the green ones are ours. Zucchini were picked fresh this morning.”

Mel, 82, and Joyce’s son Brad work in tandem to do the planting. Brad drives the tractor and Mel sits on the old planter.

“That planter is so old, it was pulled by animals at one time,” said Joyce.

Best seller? “Tomatoes. That and watermelon. I put two little bitty ones on the stand. Fifteen minutes later, they were gone. People would rather get our small ones or ugly ones that are home grown. They know they have a better taste.”

How long will you have tomatoes? “Till September sometime. If plants keep putting on. We have replanted some tomato plants. Many have late tomatoes. First frost will take care of everything. If we have early frost, goodbye everything.

Varieties? Yellow tomatoes, Beefsteak, Early Girl, Lemon Boy. There are stripey ones, Rutgers, pink ones. They fly off the stand. Pink and yellow tomatoes are less acidic.”

What will make the tomatoes happy? “When it stops raining and gets really hot. We’ve had some little ones, some little cherry ones and a few patio ones. As far as the big ones, we just need sun.”

This story was originally published July 12, 2015 at 3:00 AM with the headline "Vegetable stand works on the honor system."