Stallholder applications are now open for this special birthday year of the UK’s leading food festival.
Abergavenny Food Festival has opened applications for stallholders, inviting the very best craft and artisan food producers from across Wales and the UK to apply to join the festival in its 20th anniversary year.
Organisers of the festival, due to take place on the weekend of 15th/16th September 2018, are inviting applications until 12th March, and say they particularly want to hear from exciting new food businesses and those that haven’t been to the festival before. They are especially keen for applications from young farmers and food producers, those making raw pickled or fermented products, and the craft-led artisans making the very best of British cheese, charcuterie, beer, wine and more.
Once applications have closed at midnight on Monday 12th March, they are reviewed and selected by a prestigious panel of judges, including Abergavenny Food Festival founder, Martin Orbach, Italian chef Franco Taruschio, and ex-Director of Borough Market, Keith Davies.
In 2017 the festival attracted over 30,000 visitors over the festival weekend with appearances from Tom Kerridge, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Darina Allan. The festival markets cover a diverse range of quality and artisan produce from Wales and
across the UK, and sprawl throughout much of the town over the busy festival weekend. For this landmark year of the festival, there will of course be some exciting additions to the markets for visitors. Aine Morris, Chief Executive of Abergavenny Food Festival explains: “Back in 1998 when the festival first started, Abergavenny Food Festival was unique because we brought together craft farmers and food producers, who often didn’t have
access to mainstream retail markets. Twenty years later, and in part thanks to the pioneering approach of events like ours, many British craft producers can be found in Waitrose or online through retailers such as Ocado.
“The ways in which people shop for food has changed, and is continuing to change rapidly as consumers look to buy food with provenance and integrity, often via an online platform or market. “The challenge for us as a food festival is to ask how we can continue to innovate over time? To celebrate the 20th birthday edition we will be re-designing our existing market sites, adding more experiences and learning opportunities to engage our visitors in trying and tasting new things.”
So if you’ve never taken a stall at Abergavenny before, if you make a quality product, with a great story, local to your region, which tastes delicious, then the festival wants to hear from you.
To apply for a stall for this year, please go to the ‘Get Involved’ section of the festival
website for more information and to submit your application.
Nick Saltmarsh, Managing Director of Hodmedod, who were recently awarded Best Food Producer at the BBC Food and Farming Awards, said: “Hodmedod will be jumping at the chance to have a stall at this year’s Abergavenny Food Festival. It’s always busy, exciting
and fun, and we love talking to the very engaged festival-goers about our British-grown
pulses and grains. It’s a great place to catch up with old customers and to meet new
ones.”
Mark Moody, Head of Live Events at Riverford Organic Farmers adds: “We had a very jolly
two days chatting with the Abergavenny Food Festival goers – it was great to put our
brand in front of so many likeminded people. We had over 70 new customers join us for a
weekly veg box and many more engaging positive customers leaving our stall knowing
much more about what we do, and starting to Live Life on the Veg with us!”
