KEYSTONE — Nectaria Koumbis believes a farmers market should be part of a community. She just wishes more people knew their community has one again.
Koumbis, along with her husband, Pete, and their family, took over the Keystone Farmers Market in October 2025 and spent the following months rejuvenating and expanding a business that first opened on Brooker Creek in 1978 before shuttering.
They have succeeded in growing the market, both in size and in the range of local products it stocks. Now they are trying to get the word out.
The plan is simple: Reach out to the community, which Koumbis has done through social media and word of mouth.
“Oh, my, so many times people will come in (to the market) and say, ‘I had no idea you were here’ or ‘I had no idea you were back open,’” she said. “And we are very about the community, from local vendors and products and being a part of this community.
“We’re a mom and pop market, we’re not Publix, so we like to keep decent prices and provide the community with the local products at those prices. We just need the community to know we’re here.”
When Koumbis asked the community what it wanted, the questions were as simple as “What can we do?” and “What are you looking for?” The answer wasn’t just more local and organic products. Customers wanted — and loved — the interaction, the quaintness of a local expert on hand to help them.
That interaction has taken shape in camps and field trips on the property. Eventually, Koumbis said, the market will add livestock — it already has cows — and visitors will be able to learn from an agriculture expert. Students from Creative World School even left with a plant to take home during a June 29 visit.
A day later, on June 30, Koumbis held the second Senior Farmers Market, where seniors can pick up a basket of vegetables, fruit, cheese and other items. She and her staff hand-pick the contents, offered free, on the last Tuesday of every month.
“Both of those came about, honestly,” Koumbis said, “just from me making a post on our Facebook page and asking what they would like to see, both with, maybe, education or kids or customers or maybe seniors. And it came off those responses, while other responses just wanted us to be somewhat like Keystone Farmers Market was before it closed.
“And we are, but we have also expanded. They try to tell me there’s not room for (certain products or expansion) and I say, ‘I’ll find room!’”
The market has long been known for boiled peanuts, cold drinks, fresh fruits, vegetables and bait fish.
“While we don’t sell bait fish anymore, our legendary boiled peanut recipe hasn’t changed a bit,” Koumbis wrote on the market’s website.
More expansion is planned, but it will take time, Koumbis said. Money is a factor, so the family will have to save up to grow the farm and livestock operation and perhaps enclose the market so the organic products last longer.
Koumbis has worked with holistic products for 30 years, and Pete has spent just as long with organic fruits and vegetables — making the market, in Koumbis’ words, “their dream come true.”
“Again, we’re not Publix, nor do we want to be — because we don’t have big freezers and we keep our prices fair, and they’re going to be exactly what you would pay at the docks for seafood or a farm for meat or vegetables,” Koumbis said. “Because that’s how we feel it should be for these types of products.”
Keystone Farmers Market
Where: 12615 Tarpon Springs Road, Odessa
When: Open Daily at 8 a.m.
For more information, visit https://www.keystonefarmersmarket.org or call 813-455-4192 or visit the market’s Facebook Page.