In the year since debuting the Western Mass Vegan Food Fest, founder Egg Henrici has learned a few things about how to optimize operations. Now, they’re getting ready to launch the event’s fourth iteration — its biggest yet.
Western Mass Vegan Food Fest returns to Abandoned Building Brewery in Easthampton on Sunday, June 7. Running from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., the event will host nearly two dozen vendors. While a few applications are still pending, the current food lineup includes Little Loaf Bakery, Like No Udder, Midcoast Vegan, Veegmyeats, RastaRant, Belmont Vegetarian, Peckish, Mothers Moss, Madrina Vegana, Grounded Confections, Vegan Pizza Land, Aroy Thai Garden, The Lassi Lab, Thai Chili Truck and Gnütze.
“People love the food — it’s so good. I’m gonna brag a little bit, but these are my favorite vegan food vendors, and I have really good taste in vegan food,” they laughed. “That’s the biggest feedback that I get: ‘Oh my God, all of these vendors are so good,’ and I’m like, ‘Yeah, I know!’”
Guests’ appreciation for the food has helped keep the festival going, but another benefit, Henrici said, is that the gathering is a homegrown operation rather than a big corporate event. It also helps that they’ve been able to make changes based on audience feedback from previous years, including expanding the layout to feature both indoor and outdoor spaces while addressing long wait times. To that end, the festival offers staggered entry and VIP tickets that allow guests to skip the entrance line — though not individual vendor lines — for a small fee.
“I’m not doing this to make money,” Henrici said. “But it is a lot of work, and it is nice to be paid for the labor that I do.”
Though the event is centered around vegan food, it’s not exclusive to people who are fully vegan. In fact, Henrici said informal polling at the entrance shows the demographic is usually split evenly between vegans and “vegan-curious” attendees. Still, Henrici, who resides in Ashfield and works in Greenfield, noted that one of the most common requests they receive is to create more opportunities for the community to connect. To answer that demand, they plan to start hosting vegan meetup events this fall.
“[There are] so many people, especially those who are recently vegan, who say, ‘I want to meet other vegans. I had no idea that I was surrounded, secretly, by other vegan people, and I want to get together, and I want to exchange recipes. I want to talk about restaurants. I want to share vegan tips,’” they said.
As has been the case in the past, rabbits are a major part of the event’s theme. Henrici has five pet bunnies, and their personal dedication to the animal is hard to miss: during a recent visit to the Gazette, they wore a rabbit-themed shirt from last October’s market, and six of the eight stickers on their water bottle were rabbit-themed. Fittingly, Save the Buns, an organization that rescues former laboratory rabbits, will be on-site to promote its work alongside the activist group Western Mass Animal Rights Advocates.
However, there won’t be any live animals at the event. Bunnies are highly noise-sensitive, meaning the environment would be far too overwhelming for them, Henrici explained. That doesn’t stop them from checking in, though. Even when Henrici isn’t home, they check on their pets often via webcam.
“If people want to see live rabbits,” they said, “just flag me down and be like, ‘Hey, let me see your rabbit webcams!’”
The vendor lineup also includes Tendril, which will be selling plants — “a very vegan thing,” as Henrici put it. Additionally, the gathering will collect donations for the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts. Guests are encouraged to bring cash, checks or unexpired, unopened shelf-stable foods.
Though this will be the festival’s biggest iteration yet, Henrici doesn’t necessarily want it to expand further. With the event at its current size, “I think we’re in a really great place,” they said.
“If it got bigger, it would be overwhelming, so I really like where we’re at. I want to just keep doing this indefinitely,” they said. “I like knowing what to expect. I like not being surprised by things, so I really love the idea of this being almost exactly the same — the same vendors, the same guests, the same weird little guy greeting you at the door. That’s me.”
Admission to Western Mass Vegan Food Fest is free, but tickets are required. VIP tickets are available for $12.51 via wmassveganfoodfest.eventbrite.com. For more information and updates about the festival, visit instagram.com/westernmassveganfoodfest. The event is family-friendly and will happen rain or shine.
