The Downtown Donut Festival took over Margaret T. Hance Park Sunday, where people from all over the community came to enjoy delicious doughnuts and an afternoon of entertainment.
The festival featured 20 donut vendors ranging from local favorite BoSa Donuts to large chains like Dunkin’ Donuts, with some offering specialty doughnuts specifically for the event.
Event attendees were able to grab a beer from Arizona Wilderness Brewing Co., buy lunch from various food vendors, that included pizza and sushi, and even grab a cup of coffee from Sweetz Cold Brew.
Hailey MacCallum, who was helping run the Sweetz Cold Brew stand, said that she loves to go to different festivals across the Valley to show off what her coffee shop has to offer.
“I think the coolest thing is definitely just being involved in the community, and teaching people the benefits of cold brew and just introducing people to really good coffee,” MacCallum said.
Besides the variety of food and drink, there was also live music from New Wave Order, The Maya Spectra and Davina, as well as a number of lawn games to take part in.
Children were also able to participate in the event by making their own paper doughnuts at the craft zone or jumping in the bouncy house.
Event organizer David Tyda said that the success of last year’s Donut Festival made it a necessity to put the event on for a second year.
Tyda had been putting on events in Scottsdale for a while, and five years ago, he brought the Phoenix Pizza Festival to downtown Phoenix.
Along the way, he says that he was able to meet some people from Downtown Phoenix Inc., a community development group that works toward the revitalization of the city by collaborating with businesses, community groups and City of Phoenix leadership.
After putting on the pizza festival for a few years, Tyda decided to add a Donut Festival to the day after the pizza festival. When he told Downtown Phoenix Inc. about it, he said they loved the idea.
“They help foster a spirit of collaboration, creativity and business growth,” Tyda said. “They help promote the festivals and stay in touch to lend a hand when needed. Conversely, they help me produce events that make downtown a vibrant place.”
Besides this collaboration with Downtown Phoenix Inc, Sunday’s event was co-hosted by food blogger Diana Brandt, also known as AZ Foodie. She collaborates with events and restaurants to give the community a sense of the growing food scene in the Valley.
The festival had an estimated crowd of 3,000 people, with some of them even coming from out of town.
Out-of-town attendee Kathy Schmidt said that she and her family usually only come to Phoenix in the wintertime, so they decided to check out the festival for a family afternoon.
“It’s a lot of fun, there’s a lot of fun things to eat,” Schmidt said. “We tried about ten different kinds of doughnuts. This was kind of an adventure and kind of like a family outing, so we had a good time.”
Jeff Devaughn, who also attended the festival for the first time, went to the Phoenix Pizza
Festival the day before. He said that he will definitely be back next year for the event.
“The food is amazing, and I do like that it is a little bit less crowded than other festivals,” Devaughn said.
With the help from Downtown Phoenix Inc. and the continued support from the community, the annual Donut Festival is set to continue in future years.
“DPI has once again helped to brand this festival as a Downtown Phoenix community event just as much as it is a food festival,” Tyda said.
Contact the reporter at adiazvic@asu.edu.
