Why I probably won’t Eat! Vancouver in 2009
19 Comments
Karen Hamilton
June 17, 2008
This post should have been up weeks ago. Better late than never.
I had been eagerly awaiting the arrival of Eat! Vancouver months before it opened its doors on May 23rd. The promise of food, wine, and a BBQ cook-off was almost too much to bear. Perhaps my expectations were too high. Perhaps I should have guessed that this event would not have been to my taste. Whatever the case may be, Eat! Vancouver 2008 was a huge disappointment and a waste of my time, money, and excitement. A massive overhaul in event management is needed before I’d consider coming back in 2009.
That being said…it wasn’t an utter failure. Components of the festival are worth a positive mention. Other parts were great in theory but were poorly executed.
Most of it was a gong show.
The Good
I’ve already spoken well of the Marriott Airport Vancouver butter sculpture and Edible Vancouver magazine in an earlier post. Here are other highlights.
BC Chef’s Association: Chocolate and Food Exhibitions
There weren’t a lot of chocolate submissions inside the Chocolate Exhibition pavilion, but that’s okay. The non-chocolate entries were way more impressive. Besides the butter sculpture by the Marriott, a bevvy of professional and amateur artists in the world of culinaria displayed meals that were less a delicacy than a work of art.
The centimetre of shellac that encompassed each perishable dish only leant to the surrealism of the displays.
Jennifer Jones of Malaspina College created an amazing cherry blossom tree sitting atop a glowing green sphere…all out of spun sugar. It could have been venetian glass.
Pulled Tea with Tourism Malaysia
There were an inordinate number of booths manned by Tourism Exotic_Locale_Here. Malaysia, Indonesia, New Zealand, and others represented the cuisine of their homeland, presumably in an effort to book your next vacation for you. In Tourism Malaysia’s case, they flew in Chef Mior to demonstrate his acrobatics as he pulled tea for the crowd. It took me 20 minutes in line to be able to photograph his antics and try a free sample, but in this instance, it was worth it.
The Bad
BBQ and Chili Cookoffs
Nice idea; poor fit. The booths were removed from everything else since the grills had to be outdoors. It was out in the scorching heat. Samples ran out in seconds. There was supposed to be a chili cook-off too, but God knows where and when that was supposed to be. If this had been its own distinct event, like the June 15th Smoke on the Water BBQ competition in Kelowna, I’d be camped out for samples all weekend long.
Welcome Kits of Worthlessness
A huge plastic bag of junkmail was proffered to every visitor. Some people, caught unprepared, might appreciate it as a receptacle for all the brochures that will be thrown at them by exhibitors. To me it was nothing but a waste of paper and plastic. If they were giving out reusable bags or even stuff like Feed 100 Bags at the door, I would have been more likely to tolerate advertising inserts that may have come bundled with it.
No Room to Lay Your Head (or Your Fanny)
You’d think that hosting an event in a 60,000 capacity stadium means plenty of room to rest your tired feet. Unfortunately, stadium seating was unavailable to the masses. You had to try your luck securing a seat at a partially-attended cooking demo or in the crush of people at the food pavilion. During the 2 hours of wandering around, our attempts to have a breather were foiled. Curses!
The Ugly
The Crowds
I detest crowds. I detest line-ups even more. The worst possible thing to ask me to endure is an event with thousands of people all milling about to queue up for something that they can’t even identify from their place in line. The longer the lineup was, the more people wanted to wait for it. Arrrrgh.
We deliberately went on Sunday figuring that we’d be avoiding the Saturday rush. It still felt like we were packed in like sardines. I cannot imagine how it must have been like the day before. Perhaps a little like this?
The Crowd, originally uploaded by wishymom.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Admission is $14. Since the venue has exclusivity rights with the evil monster that is Ticketmaster, I also paid a hefty “processing” fee to purchase tickets in advance. Sitting in front of my computer at home, I’m thinking that this better be a worthwhile event.
As soon as you enter the mammoth venue, the first thing you see is a ticket booth. Fine; we were forewarned that food samples are extra. We decide to tour the booths first to calculate how much we’d need to spend on tickets.
It wasn’t a happy assessment. Tickets came in $10 or $20 sheets. Booths charged anywhere from 1 ticket to a whopping 8 tickets per sample. In the beer and wine pavilion, they even charged 2 tickets for a wine sampler glass. One could easily spend an additional $40+ for enough food and drink to satiate a growling belly.
No thank you!
For Pete’s sake, pick a revenue strategy and stick to it! Charge a higher admission and ensure that samples are included. Or let the event be free and let exhibitors charge for samples (where revenues are shared with the event organizers). Determine that most of your profits will be through exhibitor fees and sponsorships if you have to. Just don’t get your public pissed off that they’ll have to spend over $50 to wait in 20-minute queues for food samples of highly questionable quality, and then find several leftover tickets in their pockets when they get home!
Bites of Vancouver
Since we’re on the topic of quality, let’s investigate the food pavilion next. What self respecting foodie celebration would populate its food pavilion with cheapo fast food eateries? With the exception of Tequila Kitchen and Cassis, the majority of the booths hawked fare that I could have bought at a dodgy open-air concert. Fast food curry, fast food Tex-Mex, fast food Asian. It was with extreme disappointment that I vacated the Bites of Vancouver Pavilion without a single taste on my lips.
The Verdict
Sigh. This could have been such a great event if it hadn’t been so crowded and if I had gotten to eat more (without feeling like it was burning a hole through my wallet). A hungry Karen makes for a grumpy Karen…and no one likes that.
Will you go to Eat! Vancouver next year? You tell me.
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19 Responses to “Why I probably won’t Eat! Vancouver in 2009”
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I am totally boycotting next years event.
But seriously. Exact same thing happened in Perth at our last food festival. Too many people, most of whom were drunk on wine samples by 11am, disgusting food from tacky vendors, and the need to spend inordinate amounts of money to try anything good.
Sounds like the scenario is much the same everywhere.
Thanks for the review. It doesn’t sound like my cup of tea, either. Rather spend the money at Dine Out Vancouver.
Thanks for sharing the experience.
I haven’t been to an Eat! Vancouver event, but my experience with events of this sort have always been disappointing. The amount of suckage is usually in direct proportion to the amount of money they spent on advertising said event.
I went to Eat Vancouver last year and it was terrible. Crowded, over-priced, hectic… Everything is done in a half-assed way, so the event end up not being worth the admission price at all.
Great review!
Hello all!
Matt: I like to keep hope alive. There must be a city out there who does know how to put on a wicked food festival. Maybe you’ll come across a good one while you’re gallivanting across Europe.
WC: Dine Out Vancouver is a better investment if you know how to pick ‘em. I have a DOV game plan; will share it in a future post if you can remind me =)
JS: Hear, hear. You’ve jogged my memory about a similar event that was run quite well. Since it was not for profit, there wasn’t much of a marketing budget; since it was not for profit, they were able to charge minimal fees for high quality samples. Currently drafting up that event review…coming soon!
Anya: We didn’t go last year because we heard about it too late. Perhaps that was a blessing in disguise. It’s too bad that they do things half-assed, because if they chose to narrow their focus and do those things well, I think the organizers could really turn things around.
Sorry to hear it was such a horrible time! Glad I didn’t end up going this year. I went I guess that was 5 or 6 years ago now and thoroughly enjoyed it, leaving stuffed having not spent more then the $6 discounted ticket price I paid.
Oh, noes! Your post does not encourage me to go to Eat! Vancouver 2009…
Jake: Gasp! It was only $6 when you went?! What format was it…free samples with admission? Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to return their earlier format. It feels like they’re stretching themselves thin anyhow.
Raul: It was painful to write a review so negative since we had such high hopes for this event. Mine echoes sentiments I’d read earlier on sites like MealMax.com. Hopefully the organizers are searching the web for feedback and will take reviews like mine and others into account for next year.
Nope, I won’t be going next year either. It was way too much money for not much. It doesn’t even come close to “Bites of Seatttle” in August and even the Nibbles and Bites event in Richmond is better than this and it’s free.
I was very disappointed after taking a day off to attend.
If you want to try other more tastier festivals, I’ve hear the Portland Food Festival is also worth checking out. It happens the same weekend as the Elephant Garlic Festival whic is just north of Portland.
I lied, just looked at my ticket stub (have all my stubs from Vancouver events) and it was $7 for the 2003 show. I was off by a dollar
I didn’t pay a penny to sample anything. There was a foodish fair and cider/beer/wine tasting place gated off where you had to pay for stuff but we completely avoided it and left stuffed. The giant pieces of candied smoked salmon we had were amazing – went thru the lineup twice, hehe. Some lineups were long but given the sample sizes, I wasn’t complaining having to wait.
Potato milk, ice cream(x2), candied salmon, salads and sandwich samples are what I recall most with the highlight for me watching Christine Cushing live! I don’t get why anyone trying to promote their business would charge for samples – they’re for promotion which are tax write-offs and probably the cheapest way to acquire new customers!
isn’t eat vancouver the event serey used to volunteer with or help organize. i find these things are better (cheaper & higher quality, oddly enough not a contradiction) when they’re relatively small and local. i also remember going way back and there were samples, and you only payed for ‘meal-sized portions of stuff. with big name celebrities and vendors, they start charging more for tickets (and probably booths, which is possibly why they offer less)? who knows – anyways, some of my friends are going down to somefood festival in seattle july 19-20 … if i end up going down with them i’ll let you know how it goes … i probably won’t go since i’d rather splurge on a nice meal instead
Holly: Thanks for mentioning all those festivals. I will definitely look into the Bites of Seattle and Nibbles and Bites events…they sound right up my alley =)
Jake: Christine Cushing used to be one of my favourite Food Network Canada chefs. It would have been so exciting to have seen her live. And I completely agree with you about free samples. My theory is that the event’s overhead has burgeoned and charging for samples is a cash grab just in case they don’t make a profit.
Jay: Let me know if you do go to Seattle for the food festival. Which one is it?
That was the Bites of Seattle in July. I went this year (3rd or 4th time?) and it was awesome as always.
You’ve got to try Tom Douglas’ et al. sample plate of top local restaurants. It’s always worth the money (about $10)and proceeds goes towards an anti-poverty organization. It’s a win-win situation.
From what you say it sounds like all the ticket income goes straight to the `evil` TicketMaster & none of that goes back to the booth & display people.
From my own personal experience some of these shows charge up to $10,000 dollars for a 3 meter wide booth frontage.
I don`t think many of the little places that serve the greatest food can afford That.
I don`t think they can visualize a predictable return.
On top of all that they usually have to pay that 10,000 dollars even 6 months in advance.
And don`t forget the exhorbinant electricity fees they charge on top of that.
Thats right, if they want electricity they pay maybe a hundred dollars a day extra for that.
I could go on.
[...] I suggest checking out their website to learn more. Although the event sounds exciting, I found this post on the “good bad and the ugly” from the 2008 event, which may give you pause, or at least, adjust your expectations. Tags: [...]
Eat Your Wallet Vancouver ?
I found EAT Vancouver to be a waste of time and money. Not only is the admission fee $15, but the price of the sample plates are ridiculous! You are paying anywhere between $4-$8 per sample, which is a the amount I would expect to pay for a meal or appetizer at a local restaurant. It costs $3 or 6 tickets for 2 tablespoons of rice and a tablespoon of butter chicken. It costs $1 for one samosa, you can get 4 samosas’ for that price. If restaurants are trying to promote their food, they should be giving out FREE samples. If people want a plate of food, then they should charge you the tickets. For the price of $15, you walk out with nothing but a piece of liqorice the size of your pinky finger, that they give you at the door when you enter. That is it!! Not worth it, you are better off saving your money and going out to dinner. There was a 15-30 min line-up at some of the booths. Way too over priced and over crowded!!
I heard it was must do in Vancouver. BUT that was a few years ago. i when on sat. wow, very little samples and not a lot of variety. I didn’t eat prior to the event, big mistake. I was so hungry when i left, i ended up going to Costco eating a hot dog and there samples. VERY disappointed. The only thing worth saying, CASH GRAB
next year, IM GOING TO COSTCO FOR EAT VANCOUVER
Way, way too crowded. Jam packed. Couldn’t even walk through the aisles. Not worth it. Will not go again and will advise friends and associates against it. You couldn’t pay me to go, seriously.