Taste of Madison 2009
The Taste of Madison is an event that marks the unofficial end of summer. Through the years the Taste of Madison has been an opportunity for the areas dining public to get to know the local area restaurants. The “Taste” seems to have morphed into a music event with food.
An event like the Taste of Madison can be a challenge for a restaurant to pull off. Assuming your budget can cover the $900 entry fee, food cost and labor for two days, you are still faced with trying to determine a food item that will showcase your restaurant and get people interested. Add to this the challenge of cooking and holding the offerings in Madison’s late summer heat and keeping the cost to under $5.
All this must be weighed against spending your marketing money in other ways to bring in business. This year it seemed that many restaurants decided to either reduce their marketing budget or find another way to spend it.
If you were to judge Madison’s restaurant scene by the vendors at this year’s event, you would think Madison was located somewhere in the Southeast Asia or south of the border. The event could have been called the “Taste of Crab Rangoon, Egg Roll and Quesadilla”.
Clearly the organizers had some trouble filling all of the slots with restaurants this year. It is hard to understand why you would have scooter sales or basement remodeling at a food event but more than likely you have to do what you can to fill the locations up. If you add to that the “Fair food” tents of cheese-fries, gyros, corn on the cob and deep fried cheese curds, you start to wonder where all the restaurants have gone.
There were quite a few catering businesses with booths this year and it seems that this is a great venue for them to reach a lot of people who may not know much about them. They also have the equipment to cook, hold and serve food at an outdoor event. While the restaurant participation was down this year, there were still a number of interesting items to be sampled.
Did you attend this years Taste of Madison? Leave us a comment and tell us what you thought.
