In the latest Shop Talk column, news about the Downtown Palo Alto Farmers Market, a boxing gym with group workouts and a pizzeria that's moving into the old Applewood space.
DOWNTOWN MARKET GOES YEAR-ROUND ... Starting next month, the Downtown Palo Alto Farmers Market will begin operating year-round. The market's all-volunteer board of directors decided in June to expand the market's operations after running it as a seasonal market for four decades. Board President Bob McDiarmid told the Weekly this summer that the they made the change for a host of reasons, including increasing market competition and a need to remain financially stable, according to Now, there are year-round farmers markets in nearly every surrounding city -- markets that customers would move to when the downtown Palo Alto market closed every December. In a survey of vendors and customers last year, they found that they were losing about a quarter of those customers who wouldn't return when the Saturday-morning market reopened in May, McDiarmid said. The market now will close for just two weeks around Christmas but otherwise stay open year-round. They planned to bring in more local prepared foods, offer cooking demos and other events. The Downtown Palo Alto Farmers Market is located on Gilman Street between Hamilton and Forest avenues. It's open on Saturdays from 8 a.m. to noon. -- E.K.
READY TO RUMBLE ... Noah Neiman, a former master trainer at Barry's Bootcamp who gained fame as a cast member on Bravo's "Work Out" reality television series, is bringing his boxing gym to Palo Alto this month. Rumble Boxing is set to open Nov. 18 at 611 Emerson St. According to the company's website, the gym provides boxing-inspired, 45-minute group workouts that include 10 rounds of full-body strength training and conditioning. Rumble Training has locations in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. The Palo Alto site is already taking reservations for boxing bags for opening week. -- L.T.
MIKE'S OPENS AT APPLEWOOD ... A local franchise of Mountain Mike's Pizza is now open at 1001 El Camino Real in Menlo Park, the former, longtime home of Applewood Pizza. This is the third Mountain Mike's for franchisees Janet Moscini and her son Brian, who own locations in Redwood City (opened in April), Campbell and San Carlos. The 5,200-square-foot space at the corner of El Camino Real and Menlo Avenue has been renovated, with new tables, flat screen TVs and a fresh coat of paint outside. The restaurant serves the same menu as other Mountain Mike's: specialty, create-your-own and gluten-free pizzas, plus wings and sandwiches. For dessert, there's a pizza cookie (literally, a pizza-sized chocolate chip cookie meant to be shared) and a pizza topped with cinnamon, brown sugar, a "dusting" of mozzarella and powdered sugar. -- E.K.
Compiled by the Weekly staff; this week written by Elena Kadvany and Linda Taaffe. Got leads on interesting and news-worthy retail developments? The Weekly will check them out. Email shoptalk@paweekly.com.
---
Follow the Palo Alto Weekly/Palo Alto Online on Twitter @PaloAltoWeekly and Facebook for breaking news, local events, photos, videos and more.
