Local Source Market expanding its operation into the West End

The popular Agricola Street shop will be taking over a former gas station on Windsor Street to provide better service to residents all across Halifax

CITYnews halifax \ Steve Gow

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A popular longtime North End market is expanding its operation in order to service West End residents.

Local Source Market has been a staple shop at 2530 Agricola Street, supplying Haligonians with locally-grown produce, baked goods and all manner of high-quality grocery items.

Now, after two years of dealing with pandemic restrictions and issues, the Local Source Market isn’t just thriving — it will be opening a new location at the corner of Almon and Windsor Streets.

“We are delighted and really happy that we are going to be able to introduce more people to all of our producers, growers and farmers that we have here in Nova Scotia,” says owner and operator Krista Armstrong. “I’ve always known that we could have a few Local Sources, especially here in Halifax.”

With plans to open the new location in the spring, Armstrong is fulfilling a goal that began quite soon after she took over the business four years ago.

“I’ve been looking to grow for a few years and just could quite find the right space that I was looking for,” says Armstrong. “Then this amazing, super cool vintage building popped up and I thought the West End needs some love, and I just thought this gas station would fit us perfectly.”

Located at 2790 Windsor Street (across from the Brooklyn Warehouse), the former service station was an ideal match for Armstrong. It has plenty of space for fridge capacity and goods, parking and a large covered canopy that will enable Local Source Market to keep up with increased curbside delivery that has become a part of the business model over the course of the pandemic.

“I always thought that we’d never go online because I believe in the service of grocery shopping, I believe in the enjoyment of grocery shopping, I believe in the smell and the touch of your food and chatting with shopkeepers,” notes the Annapolis Valley native. But everything changed once rising COVID-19 cases began shutting down businesses in Nova Scotia.

“I’m sitting at home in March 2020 with a seven month old on my lap and these eleven families looking at me saying what do we do now,” recalls Armstrong about adapting the business model online. “It was a big moment, so I learned everything that I could possibly learn about Shopify in five days and we pulled up a pretty great online platform, and it just hasn’t gone away.”

Local Source Market’s virtual business model won’t be the only thing that is not going away. Along for the ride will be Boxing Rock Brewing Company, who will be moving from the Agricola Street location to Windsor Street where they will have more space for their on-site nanobrewery, bottle shop and filling station.

“This new location will allow us the space we need to integrate home delivery, curbside pickup, our Test Kitchen nanobrewery and in-person retail and growler filling so we can have one central hub in the HRM to connect with our customers,” states Boxing Rock co-founder Emily Cowin in an email. “Our customers are diverse and so is our business so bringing together all these aspects under one roof will allow us to better serve all our customers in the HRM.”

Armstrong is thrilled to partner once again with Shelburne-based brewery and predicts the new location will fill a need for Local Source Market’s customers that travel from West End.

However, fans of the original location should not worry — Armstrong says she intends on keeping that store in operation and insists customers will not notice any changes at the Agricola Street shop. Once the new location does open at Windsor Street, it will mark the second franchise for Local Source Market, however Armstrong admits she may not be done with expanding the business quite yet.

“I don’t know if I want an empire but three or four Local Sources would be great,” laughs Armstrong. “You see a lot of foot traffic here on Agricola Street but many guests come from the West End and South End (and) a lot come from Dartmouth as well.”

For more information on Local Source Market, visit the website.