The Oregon City Farmers Market just opened their fabulous Downtown Winter Market!

If you are looking for unique Northwest gift ideas this holiday season, bring the family to check out the festive atmosphere and meet local vendors.

Located on 8th at Main in downtown Oregon City

Open every other Saturday from 10am – 2pm

Best dates for holiday shopping  ::  Nov. 20th  |  Dec. 4th & 18th

See you there!

Public Marketspace was created as an online partner with farmers’ markets and public markets. And when the weather turns cold in some regions, the season is just getting started somewhere else.

Fall is a time to be thankful for friends and family, and to begin thinking about the holiday season.  Gift giving can be even more meaningful when it comes from the heart, and the best stuff doesn’t always come from the mall.

People that love shopping local should appreciate that we are working to provide a space where you can buy from these community market vendors online.  So if you are from Minnesota or Arizona… and whether you are discovering something new, or looking to make a repeat purchase from your favorite vendor—we want you to enjoy your time on PublicMarketspace.com

In the mutual interest of helping emerging entrepreneurs, Public Marketspace is teaming up with Square™ to give away 6 of these incredible new credit card readers + an iPad to facilitate point of sale transactions.

People are buying with plastic cards over cash. The Square creates an opportunity to process credit card payments on mobile devices everywhere, and that is good for small businesses anywhere!  Video

This contest has been rescheduled for 2011.  Random drawings will be held weekly.  A total of 6 prizes will be given away—one per week for 6 weeks.  Prize winners will be announced every Friday.  Official rules will be posted on our website, and registered PM Vendors can increase their odds of winning by:

• Becoming a Fan of PublicMarketspace.com on Facebook
• Following @marketspacenews on Twitter
• Email us at contest@publicmarketspace.com in 30 words or less “How Square could help my small business.”

All registered PM Vendors are eligible to win, but all PM Vendors must be a small business owner.  By registering on Public Marketspace, Vendors will be eligible for all 6 prize drawings.  Join Today

August is Food month at Public Marketspace and that means registering vendors, celebrating events and talking about one of our favorite things… FOOD!

When it comes to locally grown favorites, the finest ingredients, urban cart chic or the best dive in town—PM loves to share recipes to websites, and creating an immersive experience is how we sell food online.

Answering a question from one of our members, the best part of buying directly (or Vendor Direct) on PM is that you buy direct from the vendor and know exactly how the food was raised, grown and prepared. Which isn’t always the case at your local grocer, and learning about the coolest neighborhood restaurant in town is part of fun too.

There is nothing quite like buying a fresh box of green chilies from New Mexico, berry jams from Oregon, or organic fed beef from Montana. Vendors that sell perishable food, wine and beer directly can post products on PM and link to their site for purchase and shipping options.

Once you discover a taste for artisan foods, and learn more about the vendor, it is hard to resist the shop local availability of the online public market.

How much good can one company do in the world?  We hope to find out.

Introducing socialized shopping—an idea that sprouted from the convergence of Social Media, Search Optimization and eCommerce.  Three strategies that are valuable to an organization of any size, but our platform exclusively serves small business owners and emerging entrepreneurs.

Why?  Because every town has a main street.  Competing online is now part of thriving, surviving and economic recovery.  And…

• Handmade represents the new manufacturing base
• Neighborhood shops on city boulevards represent risk taking innovation and urban growth
• Local service providers represent can-do character and the individuality that can rise above commodity

PublicMarketspace is more than a company; it is a cause.  Our vision is facilitating a marketspace where people can buy from any local merchant, anywhere in the world.  We only charge what we need to run our business and give back to the community.  The $20 annual registration / listing fee pays for support and the vetting process.  And the 3.5% resale fee is the minimum we can charge to cover transactional expenses.

We are not another business selling products on the web.  We built a custom multi-tenant cart for “one transaction” buyers assurance, and designed a gathering place to help our Vendors sell products and promote their services as cost effectively as possible—whether your small business is looking to prove a concept, looking for another sales channel, or needs to differentiate with interactive advertising.

Please take a moment to JOIN as a Public Marketspace Member, and show your willingness to support small businesses everywhere.

Thank you!

The PM Team

Small business has been called the backbone of economy, and the spirit of entrepreneurship is worldwide—in every community and every neighborhood.

When Big Business moved out to the freeway exits it devastated Main Street. Now big business is gobbling up online real estate and making it difficult for entrepreneurs to compete there too.

Now imagine buying directly from a local business anywhere in the world. If the future world market will be driven by the connectivity of the Internet, then Public Marketspace will be the online channel to buy from local vendors anywhere. Making it virtually possible for small business to compete everywhere.

What a wonderful world that could be!

What would our online public market be without our handmade Vendors?

The artists, designers and craft merchants that gift us with their unique talents are the cornerstone of community events and block parties. And some go on road tours all summer long, strategically hitting a variety of festivals along the interstate.

We love Etsy. Because they are as dedicated to handmade products as we are, and that is why we proudly support our Vendors linking to their other stores—including other websites we admire.

Public Marketspace will do whatever we can to help our Vendors succeed. Because it takes a village to raise a small business on the World Wide Web, and we think our established entrepreneurs deserve the same variety of locations to sell their products online.

Something to do: Portland Saturday Market | Emery Bay Public Market

Public Marketspace is a social media + search + ecommerce platform for entrepreneurs. An online public market where global shops local.

We officially went LIVE with PublicMarketspace.com on June 21^st, and it seems fitting that the first day of summer and longest day of the year will be our anniversary.

While the PM Team is excited about where we are today, we will always be a work in progress tomorrow. Additional functionality and every new feature we are developing will be implemented up to our LAUNCH date in September (date: TBD).

A special thank you to our newest Members and Vendors. With your support, we look forward to creating a rewarding experience and providing you something fun to do online… a space to Shop + Share + Socialize.

Our story begins now!