POMPANO BEACH, Fla. – It’s near the end of an era for the city of Pompano Beach.
Vendors and employees at Festival Marketplace, near Florida’s Turnpike exit on Sample Road, are working to find a new home before the famed flea market closes in 2025.
Vendors officially received their letters about the end of “marketplace operations” come next June.
The letter read in part, “Our current plan is to maintain marketplace operations until May 31, 2025. This timeframe has been carefully considered to afford you sufficient opportunity to strategize and implement any necessary adjustments to your business. Mall operations will cease June 1, 2025.”
“My relationship with the customers is like a family member,” said Choudhry Mustasam, the owner of Stitch and Craft. “Believe me, this is my life. I give my life to the Festival.”
Many, like Mustasam, have built and run their shops for 30-plus years inside the famed flea market. He said he’s built a strong and loyal customer base over the years at his customization and alteration business, and says “starting over” is complicated and his memories are in that shop.
“We have very good memories,” Mustasam said as he showed off photos with world-class boxers like Evander Holyfield and Muhammad Ali. “In my store here, a lot of world champions because I used to be a professional boxer. When we move outside, where do we go? And what about my customers? My employees?”
There are booths for just about everything, from jewelry to electronics, paintings to plants, and even furniture.
Vendors said the Pompano Beach City Commission voted back in 2022 to rezone the Festival property for warehousing space.
The owner, IMC Equity, bought it in 2018.
Longtime vendors, who say they have pretty much grown up at the marketplace, are trying to figure out how to start over.
Several of the businesses have banded together, holding meetings to try and find a new space.
“Made a good living here. Great people,” said Diane Alberse, of Bocaboo Boutique, a shop she has run at the marketplace for 30 years as well. “A lot of these vendors are staying together.”
Longtime business owners are trying to move to a new spot together, hoping to leverage their collective popularity to draw in more customers to a new location.
Several vendors told Local 10 News that they are still trying to find an appropriate site. Many, however, are concerned they won’t survive this transition after decades at this site.
While some businesses have left, many are hanging tight to work the upcoming busy winter months before the marketplace closes in less than a year.
The mall has been around for decades, first as the Pompano Outlet Mall in the 1980s.
At last check, it appeared the flea market’s website had already been taken offline.