I've seen a lot of suggestions and discussion on food generation and difficulty feeding one's pets, and I thought this might be a possible solution that wouldn't severely affect game balance. I think it would at least help with the feeding issues, and I don't think it would be very hard to implement.

Basically I'm just suggesting that pet food be added to the list of items the market building can offer to trade you. After all, it's at least as commonly found on islands as stone or wood, which the market already offers to trade, and I'd personally jump at the chance to unload some of my less useful building materials (who needs 650 cuttlefish ink, really?) in exchange for something I could actually use. Another reason is that I almost never use that building when I find it because they don't offer anything I need. Having it offer food trades, especially for the more common materials, would make it a far more useful building to encounter.

I don't support this at all. Food is worth 1 coin. All other materials can be auctioned off for at LEAST 50 coins if not 100+. In the case of very rare materials people will often pay more. Trade 1 wood (worth 100 coins) for 1 food (worth 1 coin)? Why would anyone do that.

Only if it was trading food for materials would this even be remotely worth it.

*shrug* It's just an option. I would use it, since I really, really hate conducting auctions and I have tons of certain materials that I don't need. I find the Sales part of the forum inhospitable and awkward, and I only ever use the auctions when I need something really rare like adamantine. If I could turn those super-common items into something directly useful, I'd do it. I thought this would be useful for users like me who aren't fond of those systems, but if no one else likes the idea then so be it. I just wanted to put it out there.