Im trying to see if there is some way to make it so if someone adds items from a specific category that it then sets a minimum dollar amount before they can complete checkout?
I believe you could use Reinhold's shipping by rules plugin and therefore use the shipping rules to control this and use a module or the name of the rule to warn customers about it.
Better check or ask them
http://open-tools.net/virtuemart/shipping-by-rules.html