Virtual Apple Festival opens up world of new possibilities

By Mark Ribble

RUTHVEN — The annual Kingsville Apple Festival had to be held virtually this year, but according to early results, it was a hit with volunteers and viewers alike.

The 41st annual fall favourite was forced to change things up this year, but came through this past weekend unscathed.

For Community Living Essex County’s Tony DeSantis, it was a much different feeling.

So much so, that he even made a trip out to Colasanti’s to survey the empty grounds and think about what he was missing.

“It was a bizarre feeling,” he said. “Everything looked so empty.”

After 40 years, the festival was faced with either not running at all, or finding a different way to bring the festival to the people.

According to DeSantis, they were initially just going to sell the Apple Fest baskets and call it a day, but they soon came to the realization that a virtual festival could work out just fine.

The musical performances had to be pre-recorded to accommodate social distancing guidelines, but DeSantis said that analytics show that traffic to the website was very steady, especially when the bands were on.

There was also a virtual car show, hosted by CTV Windsor’s Jim Crichton, who brought a new flavour to the annual event.

“We recorded the car show a couple of weeks in advance and Jim thoroughly enjoyed going from car-to-car,” said DeSantis.

DeSantis said he wasn’t shocked by the community’s response.

“Knowing what I know about our community, I shouldn’t have been surprised at the response we received,” he said.

The Apple Fest baskets sold out a full week before the festival and they sold over 100 apple pies online. The pies were baked by Momma Bear’s Bakery.

Community Living Essex County had set a modest goal to raise about $20,000 at this year’s event and De- Santis thinks they managed to get there.

“All the totals and tallies aren’t in yet, but I’m pretty sure we made our goal,” he said.

On the bright side, DeSantis thinks there are lessons learned with this year’s event that they can take with them going forward.

“If we get to return to our live event next year, we may be able to add some of the virtual aspects from this year,” he said.

Of course, some of the regular events took place, such as the annual apple peeling contest, which was done through Zoom, with Kingsville Mayor Nelson Santos successfully defending his apple peeling title against mayors from five other municipalities in Windsor-Essex.