On Saturday, September 9, more than 7,000 people came together to celebrate compassion at Twin Cities Veg Fest 2017!
The sixth annual festival was held for the first time ever outdoors at Como Park. Attendance exceeded our expectations by thousands, which goes to show how the interest in vegan food is growing exponentially in the Twin Cities area.
The food surely took center stage, with vendors such as The Herbivorous Butcher and Root to Rise serving up their cruelty-free fare to a steady stream of hungry customers, which included vegans, vegetarians, and omnivores alike.
Other highlights included cooking demonstrations with Steve Leinen, Feed Me Vegan, and Mistress Ginger, as well as a panel discussion on farm sanctuaries. Also, Christine Coughlin, Minnesota State Director of the Humane Society of the United States, was presented with the Kenny Feldman Animal Advocate Award.
The six-hour festival was an opportunity for our vegan community to come together and celebrate how we are thriving, and it was also a chance for new folks to get a taste of what vegan living is all about. We noticed lots more diversity in the attendees this year, which is another great benefit in taking the festival outdoors.
Of course, the outdoor space will also allow us to continue to grow the festival. We learned a lot in this first year at Como Park, especially how we can better accommodate the huge crowds. (If you haven’t already, please take our attendee survey and let us know about your festival experience.)
We had lots of support in making this festival happen, and we are deeply grateful to all of these individuals:
Our planning committee was comprised of sixteen volunteers who each dedicated many hours of their time over the past nine months to organizing the festival, and then we had more than 200 volunteers helping out last Saturday. We truly could not have done it without them.
If you’re interested in being on the planning committee for next year’s festival, please contact Laura at [email protected].
Thanks also to everyone who donated to our Twin Cities Veg Fest fundraiser this past summer. You helped to make this happen, and we’re very grateful for your support. We were able to make the festival free for all to attend because of your generosity.
And thanks to our exhibitors, chefs, musicians, and presenters, all of whom added to what the festival had to offer its attendees. (We heard that many of the food vendors were surprised with the huge turnout, and some even had to return to their restaurants to get more food to sell! Next year, we’ll be offering many more vendors the opportunity to participate.)
Lastly, we want to offer a special shout-out to our festival sponsors:
- Kenny Feldman Animal Advocate
- Farmaste
- Herbivorous Acres
- Spring Farm Sanctuary
- SoulSpace Farm Sanctuary
- VegFund
- Yelp Twin Cities
- Mercy for Animals
- Eureka Recycling
- Imbue Yoga/Mary Bue
- Kelska Blu
- Lundberg Family Farms
- Rosedale Center
- The Herbivorous Butcher
- Vegan Outreach
We hope that you were able to join us for Twin Cities Veg Fest 2017 and had an overall wonderful time. We also hope you’ll be inspired to stay involved with the compassionate community.
Compassionate Action for Animals has lots of public events throughout the year, including our big Vegan Thanksgiving Potluck in November. Come to our events, volunteer, donate… However you choose to stay involved, we hope you’ll continue to celebrate compassion each and every day.