Garlic Town, USA sees epic turnout in second year within Bennington downtown
Article originally in The Bennington Banner (September 5, 2021) written by Makayla-Courtney McGeeney
Thousands of garlic lovers descended on downtown Bennington on Saturday for Garlic Town, USA.
This year’s single-day Labor Day weekend tradition follows the scaled down version of the annual Southern Vermont Garlic and Herb festival that hosted roughly 3,000 attendees in 2020. The reimagined event combined a variety of free activities and entertainment hubs as well as ticketed “cloves” where garlic vendors, artisans and food trucks resided.
Vendor booths and food stands in Cloves A and B, located in the northwest side of town near Depot and River Streets, maintained lines throughout the day. Clove C near Valentine Street offered family and children activities. Volunteers were seen handing out bottles of water as the early September weather gifted a beautiful sunny day.
One volunteer’s shirt sported the title “Captain” – Bill Clark.
Clark stays behind the scenes to make sure all goes well within the volunteer team. He’s spent 11 years volunteering and initially got involved to give back to the community. It helps that he likes garlic, too.
“There’s lots of people here today and everything is going smoothly. I don’t think we anticipated this big of a turnout,” Clark said.
“Major credit goes to the army of volunteers that make this festival happen every year even when we throw a huge curveball like a new Garlic Town event,” Southwestern Vermont Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Matt Harrington said. “We had over 100 volunteers — our tie-dye army — throughout the event scanning tickets, picking up trash, answering information, selling merchandise, getting people on buses.”
Mikaela Lewis, event coordinator for Southwestern Vermont Chamber of Commerce, was “very happily surprised” with the turnout. On Friday night presale tickets were up to 3,000 and by 1 p.m. on the day of the event they exceeded 6,000, she said.
“It’s a good day. There’s good weather. I’m happily overwhelmed,” she added.
About 115 vendors participated, and while most of them are Vermont-based, others hailed from New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Florida and even California, Lewis said…