Maitland Chamber cancels its spring art festival

Art festival season will be one show shorter this year, after the Maitland Chamber of Commerce voted to cancel this year’s Maitland Spring Festival of the Arts at a meeting late last month.

Former Chamber president and board member Stephen Clinton said the Chamber realized in late-December that registration and interest from artists and the community was so low, that they’d be better off canceling the event, which has been held annually each spring for 27 years. This year’s event was scheduled for March 12 and 13.

“It just seems like the art festival isn’t one of those things that’s been well attended by artists or residents,” Clinton said.

He said the Chamber is now brainstorming ideas for a different large-scale event for 2016 to replace the art festival, while continuing its regular networking and lecture events.

“We’re going to do some other things that will hopefully reach out to the Maitland community more,” he said.

Recent large-scale events hosted by the Chamber have suffered with lack of attendance, including the 2015 Taste of Maitland, which was rebranded as the Taste of the Town, and last year’s art festival. The rebranding of the Taste of the Town came with a new pricing structure: Instead of charging one flat, higher fee to attend, with complimentary food offered inside, the event charged attendees separate lower entrance and parking fees along with additional fees for each “taste” offered by vendors at the event.

In an interview last fall, Maitland Chamber of Commerce Administrator Jeff Aames blamed the low turnout on the new sign code changes made by the Maitland City Council.

“If you don’t have signage up to let people know about an event, you don’t have people attending your event,” Aames said.

The city’s sign ordinance has since been modified to loosen signage restrictions to allow for more advertising of events hosted at Lake Lily. But those changes came too late in 2015 to help the Chamber, which Aames said had already had their events devastatingly crippled by the old rules.

Clinton said attendance at last year’s Taste of the Town came in around 1,000 people lower than expected, which left the Chamber roughly $5,000 to $7,000 under its fundraising goal.

“We’re a small-budget operation,” Clinton said, “so missing $5,000 to $7,000 is a big deal for us.”

The Maitland Chamber operates autonomously from the city, hosting events both big and small and funding them on its own.

That hasn’t always made business easy. In 2012, the Chamber let go of its executive director due to budget constraints, opting to rely on a team of volunteers to keep the Chamber afloat. In 2013, the Chamber brought Aames on board as a full-time staff member, serving as Chamber Administrator.

After hearing news that the art festival had been canceled, Maitland City Councilwoman Bev Reponen said the city may need to reevaluate its relationship with the Chamber to help it thrive.

“I want the Chamber to be a success. I want them to draw people and business to our town,” she said. “… I think we probably need to revisit that relationship.”

During her nearly seven-year stint on City Council, Reponen said she’s seen the city’s relationship with the Chamber wax and wane over the years. In recent years, she said, that connection has faltered.

“We’re lucky to have them here supporting out business community,” she said. “We need to work on that.”

Clinton said that while the Chamber is in a state of transition, in both events and leadership, he said the future looks bright.

“I think everyone feels good about where the Chamber is going,” he said.