Slow times don't squash Zucchini Festival
Organizer of Hayward event hopes for good year despite sluggish economy
By Eric KurhiThe Daily Review
Article Last Updated: 08/14/2008 07:19:00 AM PDT
HAYWARD — When the Zucchini Festival was first dreamed up back in 1982, southern Alameda County was ripe for just such an event, organizer Richard Essi said. "We figured four or five thousand people might come," said Essi. "But 15,000 showed up." Essi said his shish kebab stand sold out at half-past noon. The old Katrina's restaurant booth did a similarly brisk business.
"And there was this one zucchini guy left with a little deep fryer, and he had a line stretching all the way to Oakland," he said. The festival is now bigger than it was at its inception, but things haven't been the same since its heyday, which Essi said fell between 1986 and 1996.
"Since then we've been getting about half as many people," he said. But it's not just the Zucchini Festival that has seen attendance drop. San Leandro's signature Cherry Festival as well as its Sausage and Suds Festival each had to go on hiatus around 2003, returning only recently.
While Essi weathered the downturn, he said the last couple years have been particularly rough, with the sluggish economy and high gas prices. This year he has fewer vendors, many of whom are reluctant to travel far to sell their wares.
Essi has gone to City Hall for financial help in the past, and remains discouraged at officials' reticence to contribute to what he calls the main event in Hayward.
They'll put money into the Russell City Blues Festival, and all that (money) goes to an Oakland organization," he said. "This is a benefit for local nonprofits. They should help us out from their promotions fund."
The festival was developed to help out local organizations such as the Boy Scouts and the Kiwanis and Lions clubs. Those groups send volunteers to the festival to collect tickets, tend bar and clean up afterward. Then, the money that would have been paid out to those workers is given to the organization.
Essi said the groups always come out ahead, but as general manager, he's the one who takes a hit. "I got to get paid for this," he said. "There were six or seven years when I didn't get paid, and that's kind of rough." But through some cost-cutting, a lot of haggling with contractors who set up the fences and portable toilets, and kind-hearted performers playing on the cheap, the festival will go on.
It's a family-oriented affair, with a large area for rides and games geared toward the younger set. Along with the blues bands, there will be more than 160 vendor booths selling the usual festival fare and food, albeit the latter with a zucchini twist. There will be roasted zucchini and stuffed zucchini, as well as subtler ways to get a squash fix — such as in the filling of an egg roll or as part of the relish used on a hamburger.
Only four food booths are exempt from the squash requirement, Essi said. "I left the junk food vendors — popcorn, cotton candy, that sort of stuff — alone," he said. "We tried zucchini ice cream once and that did not work."
Hayward Zucchini Festival, Hayward, CA August 15-16, 2009
