The northeast Austin flea market is set to reopen following a fire last Sunday that damaged up to 46 stalls, displaced vendors and caused minor injuries.
AUSTIN, Texas — A northeast Austin flea market that experienced extensive damage in a fire last weekend is set to reopen in short order.
The owners of Austin Country Flea Market announced in a Facebook post on Friday that it will reopen its doors this weekend.
General manager Rosie Young told KVUE on Monday that between 43 to 46 stalls were damaged in the fire, and all of them were occupied when the fire happened. Sixteen families also lost all of their selling merchandise, and a vendor lost a vehicle. Two people also suffered minor injuries.
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The flea market has more than 300 booths and was about 85% full, Young said. She said the flea market is a longtime community gathering place, where customers visit vendors, enjoy food and music and see people they know each week. She said Sunday is typically the market’s busiest day.
The fire is not the first to affect the flea market. Young said a major 2009 fire destroyed about 200 booths. She said another smaller fire happened in 2018.
Young said that for some vendors, their booths are their livelihood, so they made a point of trying to reopen as soon as possible.
“We’re hoping we could get us back running this weekend and everything, and just going to see what we can get done this week because we have no power,” she said. “I’ve got our electrician coming out to see what he can do. The city has to do inspections before they get power turned back on, so I don’t know how fast we can get that done. That’s our main goal is, can we get back open this weekend so that everybody can come back to work?”