For Three New Mountain Shops, the Mantra is Local

by Leslie Lytle, Messenger Staff Writer

Frequently when a new business comes to a community, it is the brainchild of corporate numbers crunchers who live thousands of miles away. An entirely different business model inspired the Mountain Goat Market, Amish Hippie and Crescent Café. The owners of these new Monteagle businesses have strong ties to the community.

Mountain Goat Market owners Eric and Spenser Duncan were raised on the Mountain and graduated from Grundy County High School. Before opening the market, Spenser taught at Monteagle Elementary School, and Eric worked as an electrician. They lived just down the street from Richie’s Market, located on the corner of Main and Laurel Lake Road. When Richie’s closed and the building went up for sale, the enterprising young couple—Eric, 29, and Spenser, 23—decided to reinvent the market as a grocery store specializing in organic and natural foods.

The Mountain Goat Market also has a deli offering a vast array of meat and cheeses. The deli’s bread and coffee come from Chattanooga-area vendors, and the Duncans use local produce as much as possible. Deli customers can eat on the spacious front porch or a small inside dining area where a quaint and curious sign reads “Please Do Park Here.” In the 1940s, the building was a Greyhound Bus terminal.

The Market is open 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday. When the Mountain Goat Trail is completed, it will pass directly in front of the store. In conjunction with Monteagle Mountain SummerFest, the Market is hosting local musicians every Friday and Saturday at noon on the porch from Memorial Day through Labor Day.

Amish Hippie owner Marla Sitten’s connection to the mountaintop is through the Nashville music scene. J. D. Oliver, owner of the Smoke House Restaurant and Lodge, hired Sitten to bring music acts to perform at the Smoke House. When Village Wines & Spirits moved to a larger building, Sitten decided the location next to the Smoke House was perfect for a store whose theme found common ground in the peace-love hippie ethic and the simple living Christian ethic of the Amish community.

In addition to hippie-inspired vintage clothing, incense, tobacco accessories, and handmade Cherokee and Navaho jewelry, the Amish Hippie offers goat-milk lotions and soaps, broom and baskets made by members of the Amish community in Ethridge, Tennessee. Sitten’s Amish Hippie brand jam, jellies, and pickles are locally made using local produce when in season.

Customers who want to sit and chat in the book nook located in the center of the store can enjoy Amish Hippie- brand spiced tea, coca mocha and locally made key lime pie. In the future, Sitten hopes to carry Amish furniture and offer a venue for local artists to market their work. The Amish Hippie is open Monday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Friday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The Crescent Café, an on-site food truck owned and operated by Mooney’s Market and Emporium, takes the concept of using local produce to its logical conclusion. Crescent Café chef Carol Manganaro bases her recipes on what’s available locally and what’s in season. The Café offers fresh-made juice, smoothies, wraps and salads. The Beatrix Potter, a summer smoothie, was inspired by the abundance of local beets, complimented by apples, carrots, celery, lemon and mint.

Café diners can eat outside at picnic tables or in the closed-in back porch. The Café is open Thursday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Crescent Café’s wraps and salads can often be found in the cooler in Mooney’s when the Café is closed.

Located on Highway 41A between Sewanee and Monteagle, Mooney’s is celebrating its second anniversary this summer. 

Owner Joan Thomas said her vision was “to offer products not available on the Mountain to reduce the greenhouse gases caused by automobiles and help save the planet.” Mooney’s is open seven days a week, 10 a.m. to 6 pm. The market specializes in local and organic products, including grains, cereals, snacks, condiments, and produce, as well as gardening and knitting supplies, antiques and art.