Six months after fire destroyed the main building of the St. Jacobs Farmers Market, a new structure has been built to house displaced businesses – but for some businesses, the rebuilding has just begun.

Ray and Brenda Anderson operate Sunny Side Up Crafts, which sold their handmade crafts out of a booth at the market.

When the fire hit, it took out half their inventory – tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of product. Their insurance company wouldn’t cover the losses.

“It was a huge blow to us. It makes me emotional just thinking about it,” Ray tells CTV News.

The couple have counted on the help of family and friends as they move through without the market.

Now, they have another source of support – donations from the community.

Shortly after the fire, the Kitchener and Waterloo Community Foundation announced that it was setting up a fund to help vendors affected by the fire.

The organization says it’s been able to raise $182,000, and will start doling some of those funds out shortly.

Within the next two weeks, they expect to give $1,000 to each of the 33 vendors who applied for help, including Sunny Side Up.

The rest of the money will be awarded based on demonstrated need.

“We’ll be looking at … the things that were devastating to them, and not covered by insurance,” says Rosemary Smith, the KWCF’s CEO.

Asked why it took more than six months to get to this stage, Smith says it’s because the donations were solicited from businesses – who want to see more safeguards in place to ensure the money is being used wisely, but also have more to give than the average person.

“It’s very difficult to raise $182,000 at the rate of $10 per check,” she says.

That’s not to say none of the donations came from personal hands.

Brady’s Meats and Deli also lost products and equipment to the fire, although insurance covered their losses.

Unlike the Andersons and some other vendors, Brady’s has a store in Waterloo it could fall back on to help fill the gap created by the market’s destruction.

Owner Rob Brady decided to put a donation box next to his store’s  cash register, ultimately raising about $1,000 for the KWCF’s fund.

 “There were a lot of people in worse position than us,” he says.

“We got the idea that we’d like to help to give something back.”

Brenda Anderson says she’s happy for the $1,000 she’s receiving from the KWCF fund – even if  it doesn’t come close to covering her and her husband’s losses.

“Everything helps, but it’s kind of a drop in the bucket to us,” she says.