11th annual Cambria Art & Wine Festival: Putting palettes and palates to good use

Success keeps building for the Art & Wine Festival, sponsored annually by the Cambria Chamber of Commerce and Allied Arts Association. Organizers are labeling the 2013 festival, the 11th annual, as even better than last year’s, which was then classed as the most successful ever.

Chamber President Mel McColloch estimated that the sellout crowds for all events included as many as 800 people, and attendance Sunday, Jan. 27, represented the ‘largest crowd we have had for that craft show, wine tasting and raffle drawing.’

Mary Ann Carson, the chamber’s executive director, said those tickets toward winning one of about 100 prizes were "a huge draw" this year. Tickets are awarded when attendees go to participating businesses, plus "we give five extra tickets when people bring in receipts for purchases, and people were bringing in lots of receipts, which means they were doing a lot of shopping around town."

Some people emailed Carson about the event’s success, saying people were having a wonderful time, and "you’d think this was the happiest place on earth."

McColloch credited event Chairwoman Nancy McKarney with a lot of the events’ success, and Carson added that having good weather nearly all weekend and the Cambria trolley running on Saturday also helped. She said the only restriction she can determine on the festival’s growth is the size of available facilities.

This story was originally published January 29, 2013 at 9:07 PM with the headline "11th annual Cambria Art & Wine Festival: Putting palettes and palates to good use."