Bow Market has taken steps to make its spaces social distancing friendly, while striving to maintain its normally cozy atmosphere. — Photo courtesy of Bow Market

By Rachel Berets

Last August, Bow Market in Union Square buzzed with activity. They hosted a week-long “Melty Fest,” celebrating dairy in all forms and organized “CommUNITY,” an afternoon of art, music, and sidewalk chalk to support a local charity.

This year the space is decidedly different, as Bow Market attempts to attract customers while adhering to public health guidelines that encourage people to stay home.

“Everybody wants to sit somewhere with a laptop and a friend and have that comfort food and the comfort experience,” said Andrew Platt, co-owner of The Biscuit, a cafe and bakery at Bow Market. “We are just trying to figure out how to create that in a pandemic.”

Most recently, Bow Market, which is home to 30-plus retail stores and food vendors, has reimagined their courtyard as an outdoor dining patio, sparsely populated with tables separated by plants and wooden dividers.

They have a contactless ordering system and reservations are required for dinner and drinks. Bow Market also takes customers’ names and numbers for contact tracing purposes and sanitizes the tables and chairs after each use.

Back in April, before Bow Market could explore outdoor dining options, they had success with another creative coronavirus solution, their “Safe Supply” outdoor market, which won “Best Pop-Up Market” in Boston Magazine’s annual “Best of Boston” issue.

Bow Market ran their “Safe Supply” outdoor grocery store multiple days a week, beginning in March.

Customers had to reserve an arrival time, wear a mask, and wash their hands before they entered the market. Once inside, customers socially distanced according to chalk markings on the ground and used contactless payment to buy baked goods, wine, beer, frozen food and more from Bow Market’s food vendors.

“They were just ahead of the game from the get go,” said Platt, of the Bow Market management. “They just kept instituting more and more safe policies, which at the time seemed jarring but now are totally normal.”

The outdoor grocery store drew upwards of 275 reservations for their Saturday markets and was able to support a number of Bow Market food vendors.

“Demand was so incredibly high that we couldn’t bake the bread fast enough. It was coming right out of the oven and into people’s bags,” said Platt.

Although Bow Market has had success with outdoor dining and safe supply markets, there is concern from Platt and other business owners that sustaining the market will not be tenable during the winter.

A number of Boston-area restaurants have closed in recent weeks and many of the restaurants that haven’t are relying on outdoor dining to stay afloat, as indoor dining guidelines keep most Massachusetts restaurants at limited capacity.

“[The colder weather] is definitely a concern,” said Tamy Chung, the owner of Maca macaron stand at Bow Market. “I think that I’ll still be okay with shipments and pre-order pick-ups, but I think that everyone is going to be facing something whether it is cold weather or not.”

Platt hopes that Bow Market customers will brave the cold for a little longer this year. “I totally see people sitting outside in parkas and woolly jumpers and still having a lemon scone,” he said.

But even if customers endure the cold for a “lemon scone,” Chung and Platt acknowledge that the community experience that Bow Market provides is on hold for now.

“People still want that comfort food but they are looking for a whole experience and we can’t provide that right now,” said Platt.

Chung has close relationships with many of her customers and has been using social media to keep in touch and check-in with them.

“I’m the type of person who feeds off of other people’s energy,” said Chung. “It’s hard to translate that online, it’s not the same. You can’t hug people anymore. The dynamic has definitely changed.”