1. 16 a coastal magazine for women
By Katie Coleman
Mindy Fitzpatrick
This is the fourth installment of Crystal Magazine’s year-long series highlighting women busi-
ness owners in Eastern North Carolina. In each issue we plan to feature a different woman and
her business experience – the good, the bad and the ugly.
Morehead City native, high school and college All-American in basketball,
US surfing title holder, now wife and mother, Mindy Ballou Fitzpatrick is driv-
en and passionate in all areas of life. She and her husband own Friendly Mar-
ket, and Mindy is responsible for the wildly successful Mindy’s Baked Goods –
and her famous tomato pie. But Mindy is quick to add that her husband Matt
was the brain behind this whole operation. He said, “It really stemmed from
our love of gardening, flowers, things of that nature. Also watching the town
kind of drift away from localism, and watching small mom and pop motels
and restaurants leave the area in exchange for chain resorts, chain strip malls,
restaurants, things like that. We kind of tied those two together and tried to
save a little bit of the Crystal Coast feel by bringing in anything local.”
WOMEN
IN Business

2. 17www.nccoast.com
Q: Why did you decide to
Q: open the market?
A: My parents died years ago. They owned the
property and it was considered a very valuable
commercial piece. About eight years ago when
the economy wasn’t good at all, my husband had
the idea. His idea was to put up a little farmer’s
market with fresh local produce and plants and
flowers. I was really a very small part of the pic-
ture then. I started off as a tent in the back. We
had Saturday vendors, and I was one of the Sat-
urday vendors. I didn’t want to do anything that
anyone else bakes. I wanted to kind of take a
chance and do stuff that I really was into, but that
would be different. From the get go, the foods
took off. It just grew every year. We go through
great efforts to keep foods at a very high quality,
to really find things that are different, that have
never been done, and I think our whole mar-
ket has evolved like us, too. We constantly try
to do new things, work with foods in season,
and the whole market has grown, similar to how
Mindy’s Baked Goods has grown. We put ev-
erything back into this business, so do our farm-
ers at the produce stand and the plant stand. I
went from a tent in the back to a small kitchen
on site, after a couple of years we added the
store. We learn from things that didn’t work,
embrace things that do, and enhance that. I’d
have say that one of the neatest things is work-
ing with Matt every single day. He was the en-
gine in this. He was the one that thought this
would be a good idea. I like that we’re a constant
work in progress, there’s still so much to do.
Q: How is opening a market
Q: different from a storefront?
A: With us, I don’t think we ever thought we’d
be this type of business. When you have a store-
front, you kind of already dictated what you have
to do and where you’re going to be. We’ve
never done that here. We’ve expanded as our
business has grown. One of the greatest assets
we have is the people that are involved with us.
You have to support local farmers, local fisher-
men, local businesses, and we’re 100 percent
that. When you come on our property, the way
we’ve changed the most is you can look around,
you see we have our own gardens. One is our
son’s, which Matt helps him with, one is our fam-
ily garden. Our plant farmer who runs the plant
stand, makes us look gorgeous. That’s stuff you
just can’t plan on in a storefront. We’re on a cor-
ner where we can expand and grown and be
as pretty as our farmers are talented. It’s amaz-
ing. When you come down the road and see us
now, it speaks volumes about our farmers. In the
same sense, when you go to the produce stand,
that’s local produce. And maybe the proudest
thing about being here is that we can showcase
how wonderful our farms and farmers are.
Q: Did you have any struggles
Q: opening the market?
A: Sitting here now, with all that’s happened
and the reception from everybody, you kind of
forget. Thinking back, you’ve got to play by so
many rules, and they’re there for a purpose and
I embrace that. Regulations on our kitchen, our
property, what the city wants us to do, impact
fees, it’s stuff you have to do. I won’t say they’re
struggles – it’s learning how to do business and
do it the right way. I’m not much on the negative
side of things. I think there’s always a way to look
at it and embrace it. In any business, you have
ups and downs. The way you handle all that is
you learn and become better prepared. We also
learned that there are different groups out here.
We love helping nonprofits. We love being the
community market. And the key to that is every-
body communicating and wanting to go forward
together.
Q: What was the market like
Q: when it first opened?
A: We had only tents. We had produce and
plants out here seven days a week. We had a
Wednesday and Saturday market where we had
arts and crafts, baked goods. It wasn’t so cleared
out. Over the years, my father-in-law has done
most of the clearing when he’s here in the win-
ters. It has changed a lot. Again, I keep bringing
up my husband, but his ability to adapt and have
us grow, he’s amazing when it comes to his fore-
sight on how to have us grow and look natural
and do it the right way.
Q: Do you have plans on
Q: expanding anymore?
A: Yes we do. A lot is based and dictated by our
customers. We have had such an overwhelming
amount of support, compliments. We aren’t the
type to get complacent and be content. We use
all this to motivate us to keep going, to make it
more and more a market that this city and this
county can be proud of, and more of a destina-
tion. I think we want to keep making more avail-
able to our customers as far as plants, flowers,
produce. It seems like every time we add on to
our store, we need more of our foods. We’d
like to feature other North Carolina products
that are like us. That’s part of the fun, wondering
what we’ll do next and doing it together. Our
kids are involved out here too. They’re very
good at working here. Matt, Jr. is well known out
here; he either works the garden or the front of
the house. Everybody knows Annie, too. Matt,
Jr. is older so he’s a little more adjusted to work-
ing out here. That’s a comforting feeling. This is
It’s not work;
it’s doing what you
love to do,
and doing it with the
best people. (CONTINUED ON PAGE 18)

3. 18 a coastal magazine for women
FACE
BODY
BREAST
Morehead City • Jacksonville • 252.222.5888
www.cc4plasticsurgery.com
Peter Kreymerman, MD, FACS
BOARD CERTIFIED PLASTIC SURGEON
a really wicked fun place to be, whether you’re working or visiting. The staff
we have at all these locations are perfect for what we do. I have to say that
the staff we have in the kitchen that work with us – we’re real big on that, no
one works for us, we all work together – it is a very fun place. I think that’s
why we can put out the amount of food that we do at the level we do. My
farmers take credit and debit, we do not. We take check or cash, but we’ve
developed our own way of charging people if they don’t have either one.
We call it friendly credit. We simply let you run a tab. Or if you live out of
town, or not coming back this way, we even provide you with an envelope
and a card with how much you owe, with our address and a stamp on it.
Our customers dig that. Some run a tab for the month and then come back
and pay it at the end of every month. If they want to run in and get cookies,
or if they have a party, or if a realtor has an open house, they can duck in
and grab stuff and we put it on their tab. That’s kind of the feel we like out
here. We are going back to the basics and the simple things in life. Promot-
ing what’s important in today’s world, which is supporting local.
Q: What drives you to keep going?
A: I think it’s probably the athlete in me. I’m very very passionate. My pri-
orities are number one, first and foremost, my husband and our kids. This is
something that we can all do together. That passion transcends to doing what
you do and loving what you do. This is not only where I work, it’s my happy
place. I love being here on a daily basis. I love that he’s beside me and that our
kids are into it. Truth be known, he’s the strength behind all of this. I get all the
credit, and sometimes that’s not fair. I was a point guard, and I’m good about
picking teammates and having people that
are better than me around me, and I think
that’s part of why we’re successful. I love
the thought of us moving forward and find-
ing the next thing, the next cool food. We
have a lot of trademarked items, the foods
we have here, you can only get here. Matt
has some unbelievable recipes.
Q: Do you have any advice for women looking
Q: to start their own business?
A: I’m very big on, don’t ask anybody for anything except for an opportunity
to make your own way. If you believe in something, it’s worth all your time
and your money to do and do it right. You can’t afford not to. Have passion.
Passion makes all the difference in the world. I think it’s contagious. I think
the staff and everyone associated with everything out here feels the same.
When you have that, you have a pride and you don’t sacrifice that, you keep
things at a level and you keep going up. Always embrace the community be-
cause it’s the most rewarding gift back to you. Knowing you’re doing some-
thing to make the area a little better. An opportunity for people to showcase
what they have and do. And then it’s like it is every day here. It’s not work;
it’s doing what you love to do, and doing it with the best people.
Q: Is there anything you wish you knew before you started?
A: No, because I think part of being in business and being successful is hav-
ing that optimism and learning the right way. If you make a mistake, not be-
ing mad, not saying, ‘I wish I would’ve done this,’ not having any regrets. It’s
embracing every situation. That’s part of the fun, figuring out where we’re
going to go next, figuring out how we’re going to do it. Figuring out the
players, who are in here with us. I’m a pretty positive girl about just about
everything. I just think there’s a lot of time wasted on thinking about what
could’ve happened, or the negative side of things. I’d rather use any energy
like that as a positive to make us better, make me better.
Q: Is there anything else you’d like to add?
A: Part of being here and doing this and part of our success has been helped
along by the North Carolina Dept. of Agriculture and the Tobacco Trust
Fund. They are people like us that understand and support local and local
farmers, and they have seen us as a viable option, and that’s awfully nice
to have that kind of support. To be able to go to people I admire and look
up to for advice – that makes all the difference. And a lot of that has come
through the Seafood Festival and being on that board, I’ve learned a lot
about business.
(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 17)