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Meeting Recaps + Information>
Highland GreenFest - Status Update Feb-09
February 26, 2009
Highlands GreenFest Planning Meeting
February Group Meeting Recap
2/17/09
The group met from 7:30-9:30 where each team provided a brief update on their progress. This is the most important month coming up between now and our next meeting on March 24th. Our goal is to finalize the majority of exhibitors, demonstrators, advertisers and sponsors over the next 30-40 days. WHEW!
In attendance: Laura Slott, Lou Muto, Anne Thornton, Renee Allessio, Tim Dalton, Sarah Dalton, Amy Jolin, Norma Bozenmeyer, Janice Brigante, Wendy & Dave Watson-Hallowell, Jill Michelle, Mike Hensly, Suzie Blodgette, and Don Weiss. Thanks to all who could join us and thanks Lou for providing a great space to eat and work in at the restaurant.
Team Progress:
Food Vendors/Eat Local
Amy and her team have taken a first stab at a menu. (see attached). Moon Doggie Coffee and Snoep Winkle Farm will handle breakfast (along with two Community Garden members who will bake muffins). Two local organizational (DeMarco’s & Two Brothers Catering) would provide lunch options and Eat Local will provide a healthy kids meal. Food will be set up between the small building and the breezeway and educational posters in up in the area speaking to issues like decoding food packaging and the 1,500 mile meal. Additionally, those buying food will also get a handout with information on where to buy or make the food they were able to enjoy during the day. This groups will need 3 volunteers all day to help provide food and collect dollars. Amy will also connect with Harvest Moon to get healthy drinks to the event since they generously supplied for us last year and took back what we didn’t sell.
Finance & Admin
Doug and Brian have helped Wendy put a budget together and then set up a QuickBooks system to record all transactions and cash flow between now and the event. In addition, the team has created forms for team members to use in making purchases and getting reimbursed for out of pocket expenses. A process is also in place to get exhibitor, advertiser and sponsorship $ into the bank quickly with all transactions recorded by those who need them. Wendy will send out the forms to make purchases and get expenses reimbursed to all team members under separate cover.
Site Team
This team can have much of its efforts in place a little later. Would be good to have a wish list press release asking for donated or loaned items. For instance, we need some tents and Eat Local has a few they can loan us from the market instead of incurring costs for rentals or purchases. Site map will have vendors be ‘tighter’ together so people are not so spread out that they can’t be found. By 4/1 we will know everything that is confirmed and can finalize our site map for the program. Anne T. and Jill Michelle are working with the town and bubbling springs to get our labyrinth in place (permanent or removable for the day). Anne will be meeting with township staff in 2 weeks to provide clarity and get commitment for our needs. If recycling bins are not clear – we can paint them with recycling themes – if not maybe we could do the painting before and have a contest at the Greenfest. We decided NOT to do formal composting from event garbage this year, but will have a compost display at the event for people to learn about their options of composting at home.
Music Team
Bernie and Michelle and Mike H. We only have 4 acts during the day so we have time for the drum circle. The group thought instead it makes more sense to have a drum circle area (designated area) or floating drum circle (bring your own drum….) have sticks and buckets there to participate (Green Team recycling buckets would work great)!. If we took the drum circle out of the music area/schedule, we can get more music acts involved. Flora Newberry and Loretta Hagen and Matty Marks are all confirmed and there is good pool of other artists to draw from. One suggestion was to include the Knuckleheads since they are the right kind of music and are a local band.
Sales Team
All forms for advertising and sponsors are in place and are part of the exhibitor pack which are now going out to as many people/businesses as we can get them to. Over the next couple of weeks please reach out to anyone you know/think may be a good fit for the festival. Feel free to simply send them the exhibitor pack and see if they are interested in being involved. Wendy is currently applying for corporate sponsorship dollars from 9 foundations/groups and our goal is to raise an additional $6,000 this way. Jade has figured out the total inventory we will need for the greenfest (kleen kanteens’ and additional t-shirts for sale) and we may have our vendor/friends at Cosmo’s creations help us tie-dye shirts this year for sale. We have also found a local vendor to ‘etch’ the SWM logo on the bottles at a discount instead of the clear ‘lables’ we have been using. We will ask our coffee vendor (moon doggie) to also sell our SWM Stainless Steel mugs at their booth this year. We will need 2 volunteers all day who are outgoing, can sell product and represent our efforts at the SWM booth this year.
Non-Food Vendor Exhibitors:
Exhibitor packs are going out to all folks who were invited last year (and those who actually were with us last year). Renee, Janice and Dave are making all the calls. Janice will try and get some additional vendors in Greenwood Lake and at Sugar Loaf. For anyone else who is going after major vendors (Laura, Janice) can use a spreadsheet that lists other groups that have been reached out to. Perhaps Don Weiss can partner with the Kids Zone to have 6-7 interactive stations about hiking. This group still needs to clarity the total # of volunteers they need for the event. It is critical
Demonstrations – can we get some demonstrations of alternative power (wind, solar, water). How does it work? Please contact who ever you know who may want to participate by the end of month if possible. Our drop dead date for all vendors to be in place is April 1st (application and checks received).
Volunteers
All team leads need to send Jade a list of what volunteers we need at least 2 weeks prior to the work detail and by 4/1 for the volunteers for the day of the event. Jade will set it up on the web to make sure people can sign up for the area they want to be part of and then Jade will pull all resources together for training and deployment.
Presentations:
We are working on getting 7 key speakers during the day including Robin Rose Bennett and Celeste Stapleton from Gardens Alive, and also major demonstrations (i.e. swales, labyrinth, composting, rain barrels, hike, etc.). Once the initial exhibitor lists are contacted, Suzie will then contact speakers and others to do major demonstrations. Our deadline to get speakers in by 3/15 (give us two more weeks to finalize in case we don’t fill in by then so we have the information in time to create the program).
Transportation:
Currently following up with certain people to get them involved. Need help to reach out to some additional folks to get a commitment to participate. Janice suggested she can help. Dave will coordinate with Tim and Janice to insure we reach out to the right folks fast enough. We are also involved in getting the ambulance, fire dept. and police – plus getting a shuttle together from off site lots. Tim will work with Suzie and Dave to meet this weekend to get all of the details together.
Marketing
We will list all of the spots that the banners are going up on (Lou will do Warwick) so team members can keep an eye out for any that fall down/need to be re-secured. Teri will do our program for us – we will have press releases each month focusing on keeping the message alive. Jade will be updating the web site with Greenfest information as it becomes available starting with teams, then exhibitors, then demonstrators, speakers, sponsors, etc. We will make sure folks can still link back to 2008 information but need to make sure this doesn’t get confusing (some have looked at that and thought this year’s dates were last year’s dates (May 3rd)! We will be producing posters to put around all 4 towns, flyers to go up and be handed out to schools, at libraries, post offices and anywhere else we can get them up. We will also create postcards that both speakers and vendors can hand out at their stores to encourage their customers to come see them at the festival. The postcards will have a place for them to put their own information and offer a free-raffle ticket the day of the festival if the attendee brings the postcard with them to the event.
Kids Zone
Norma B wants to keep the kids moving through the whole event – not just in one place. Green Passport/treasure hunt will enable all the kids to go to all of the educational places. Lots of the games will be used again from last year (planting the seeds etc.) for really young kids. The Green Team is going to invite the elementary school kids to the event during their schedule presentations at UGL with flyers and will do some advertising for us by sending flyers home with the students. Maybe the TV Science HS kids can do photo’s/videos for the results team. Lou is looking into 3 reptile/animal show for the event – any more contacts, please send them our way!
Result Team:
We are hoping to get the booth hosted by the Butler Environmental club (Heather) to get that great ‘youth’ energy into our results area. The goal is to have as many vendors/exhibitors/demonstrators to ‘push’ people over to the results booth as often as possible during the day – not just as something to do when they leave.
Open Issues/Recommendations:
1. We really want to have a ‘farm & garden area that includes information on local farms, buying seedlings, getting involved in a CSA’ buying fresh local food at the variety of farmer’s markets we have in our four towns etc. We envision this being in it’s own section and hope to get key vendors their in one place (i.e. Rogowski Farm, Bear Swamp Farm, WM Farmer’s Market, Ringwood Farmer’s Market, Warwick Farmer’s Market, Midsummer Farm and Glennwild Garden selling seedlings, etc.). Can the non-food vendor team reach out to these groups?
2. Anne T. asked how we can involve the Association for Children and Families with Special Needs in the Greenfest. Dave will get in touch and see how they can get involved as volunteers or participate in other elements of the event.
Thanks to all of you who are involved – even if you couldn’t join us the other night! Just as a reminder, here are the dates of our monthly meetings:
We will meet once a month at DeMarco's Restaurant located at 1926 Union Valley Road, West Milford - in the A&P shopping center from 7:30-9:30pm on these dates:
Tuesday, March 24
Wednesday, April 22
Tuesday, May 12
Greenfest Menu
Beverages
Moon Doggie with coffee, tea, hot cocoa, apple cider
Breakfast
Snoep Winkle Farm with breakfast sandwiches (local eggs and sausage sandwiches)
Muffins baked by local bakers
Lunch
DeMarco’s Pizzaria with
Organic pizza
Calzones made with local ingredients
Online Vegetarian Deli with
Vegetarian Wrap sandwiches
Locally sourced soup in artisan bread bowl
Rice and Beans
Local baby green salad
Kids’ Meals
Eat Local with
Happier Meals containing simple sandwich, local apple, local carrots, homemade cookie and Green word search/tie into Kids Zone activities.
Information and Outreach
A series of Where Your Food Comes From posters including
Decoding food packaging labels (Natural, Organic, Free-Range, Grass-Fed)
The 1,500 mile dinner
Food Miles Chart showing the distance that conventional food travels
Photos of Week of Food for families all over the world
Greenfest Menu as an educational handout that identifies where the food has come from. Reverse has list of local food sources such as farms, farmers’ markets, and local food websites.
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