Waldo Farmers and Flea Market — Local services in Waldo

I had heard a lot from others that the Waldo Farmers and Flea Market was a huge old country flea market and it would take me "hours" to go through every stall. Upon arrival, I realized it is not (currently, anyway) a large market. It had about 7 rows of buildings that merchants could set up stalls in. I consider it to be a medium sized market. Parking is free and there is no admission for customers. All of the buildings, with the exception of the antique mall, are not air conditioned and not well lit, even in day light. This time of year us "in season," meaning more vendors should be set up because of all the Florida tourist and snowbird traffic during this time of year. Waldo had very few vendors, and seems to be struggling right now. A lot of stalls were covered with tarps and unmanned, and most stalls were vacant. I believe only 20% of the spaces are occupied, and at least half of those were shuttered or covered up and no one in attendance to sell those wares. This left very few vendors there for customers to buy from. I overheard other customers commenting on how few vendors were open, so I don't know if this was the usual or unusual for Waldo. I was there from 9am to 10am, and no food vendors had yet opened by 10am, but food carts were there, again shuttered. In the plus side, the women's restrooms were clean, toilet bowls sparkling white, and hot water actually came out of the sink for washing my hands, plus signs were posted everywhere with a phone number to call if a bathroom issue needed to be reported, so that was impressive. Waldo FL is a community on the AAA watch list as a speed trap, one of the worst in the entire state of Florida, so make sure to go less than the speed limits while coming to and departing from the flea market to save yourself from an expensive...

After 10 years of visiting this flea market, I think it has been a very solid experience. There are good weekends and bad. Vendors have good and bad days like everyone else. Some days we find great super deals and some days nothing at all.

It's a great place to just hit on a weekend when you don't have anything planned to see what's out there. We are happy that it's dog friendly so we can take our pet as well. We avoid vendors that we don't like and browse the ones that have given us good service in the past.

I recommend not just one visit but add it as a spot for when you are looking for things that are out of the ordinary. The produce is fresh and fairly priced. The kitchen store sells commercial items at a MUCH better price than a restaurant supply store with brands that you would find in a restaurant kitchen. The vendors that sell "used" items...... well, I think they are garage sale type items. Some of them are really over priced and some are priced in the "HAHAHA this guy doesn't know what he has here" category.

All in all its worth a look see. After 10 years of living here I go at least 3 to 4 times a year (that's an average estimate)....

Not near what I expected since my last visit many years ago. The Saving Grace for this place is going to be the produce vendors and the plant vendors. They have great deals and are very well maintained for the most part. As far as most of the rest of this place it makes Sanford and Son look great. Pop's collected better stuff this looks more like a junkyard than a flea market. To the point to where they have taken tarps and covered up mountains of rotted whatever stuff. They need to come in clear out all of this garbage and get a fresh start. it appears that people are living in the woods as well as in the campers. You can't tell who is working there or who is walking around the vendors are smoking using foul language and just not professional. I get it it's a flea market you can at least run a clean environment and act like you have some sort of manners. And this is not to all people cuz there are good hard working people that are there and there are good vendors that are there just for the most part it needs a good cleaning that would involve...