Attorney Elizabeth Chambers was cash-less when she exited the 4:30 p.m. Seattle-to-Bainbridge ferry on Wednesday with her young kids, Kepler and Arden, in tow.

She’d heard an announcement during the crossing that an organization called Sound Food had set up a farm stand at the Bainbridge terminal.

“I think it’s a great idea,” she said. “In fact, as I was on the boat I thought, ‘I wish they would do this every week.’”

She set her sights on a bag each of snow peas, greens and strawberries, then hustled off to a nearby money machine.

When she returned five minutes later, the table was virtually decimated. She could hardly believe it.

“We can hardly believe it ourselves,” Sound Food’s Sallie Maron said.

The Ferry Farm Stand officially opened for business at 5 p.m. Wednesday, and based on commuters’ response, Chambers will undoubtedly get her wish for reliable Wednesday afternoon produce all summer.

The idea for the stand took root in a farm mapping project developed by Sustainable Bainbridge, in an effort to show islanders and Kitsap residents where to find locally grown food.

With that thought in mind, the 18-month-old nonprofit, whose mission encompasses advocacy and education through a broad range of sustainability-based projects, began thinking about distribution. If it was helpful to show people where all the local farms were, it would be even better to figure out a way to regularly get the farms’ produce into people’s hands, especially since the Bainbridge Farmers Market was no longer running on Wednesday evenings.

“Connecting – Sustainable Bainbridge is all about connecting,” Maron said.

Maron and other Sustainable Bainbridge board members tossed around a few ideas, a roving farm truck among them. And then they remembered the cheerful Chamber of Commerce kiosk at the Bainbridge ferry terminal, just near the bus loading area.

They could procure picked-that-day produce from Bainbridge and North Kitsap farms, bag it in $5 units, and sell it to exiting commuters, who’d get the convenience of not having to stop at the grocery store for a fresh addition to their dinners.

Meanwhile, Sustainable Bainbridge – through its pilot Sound Food program – would provide an all-volunteer sales staff along with organizational and promotional support, so that 100 percent of the proceeds would go directly to the farmers.

“It’s just so good on every level that we couldn’t pass up the opportunity,” Maron said.

For the first Wednesday market, Sound Food contracted with Butler Green Farms and Laughing Crow Farm, with a plan to also fold in other farms as the summer continued. They also got the blessing of Kitsap Transit and the Chamber of Commerce, as well as Washington State Ferries, which chipped in with its impromptu announcement.

“Everybody seems very supportive,” Maron said.

At 5:10 p.m., commuters swarmed off the boat and descended like locusts on the produce, which included strawberries, garlic scapes, broccoli, greens, sugar snap peas and carrots. Some had gotten their cash out and ready before exiting the boat.

Sound Food volunteers wore bright yellow aprons printed with their name and logo; the branding turned into something of a survival mechanism as, like beacons, the aprons helped customers identify volunteers and volunteers identify each other in the crowd.

A helmeted and bike-shorts-clad Susan Beek, picking up beans and snap peas, called the idea “fabulous”; her feedback could have served as an advertising sound bite.

“I ride my bike up and fill up my panniers with greens, and come home and eat it,” she said.

Before the stand opened, Maron anticipated that buyers would likely be hurrying, and want to get in and out. So Sound Food situated the two sale areas to facilitate traffic flow, and had plenty of volunteers on hand for sales and questions.

“We’re cognizant of the fact that people are moving quickly. It’s not going to be a chatty time,” she said.

And while it’s true that buyers didn’t linger, another Sustainable Bainbridge board member, Dana Berg, observed that the farm stand seemed to bring out a certain cheer in the normally grumpy, heads-down crowd.

“Food is friendly,” Berg said.

The day’s final take, Maron reported later, was $575, all of which went directly into farmers’ hands.

By the time the 4:40 commuters dissipated, the farm stand was consolidated to a single table, and the only items left were garlic scapes and a couple of bags of greens.

The 5:30 boat was still due to come in. What was Sound Food planning to tell those commuters?

“We’re going to say, ‘We’re so happy with the success of this farm stand – come back next week!’” Maron said.