First Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival a Triumph- How Volunteers Made the Difference
First Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival a Triumph: How Volunteers Made the Difference
Approximately 1500 mushroom lovers massed in Brookings for the first annual Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival on November 4th at the Chetco Grange. Festival-goers perused identification tables brimming with local fungi, visited vendors seller fungi-related products, and attended workshops throughout the day learning how to grow, harvest, and preserve wild and cultivated mushrooms.
Festival organizers were delighted with the turnout. Kathleen Dickson describes the scene surrounding the 10:00 am start: “At 9:45 am, people started showing up. Within 30 minutes, the place was wall-to-wall people, and it never changed!”
Festival-goers at the Chetco Grange.
Renowned mycologist and Professor of Biology at San Francisco State University, Dr. Dennis Desjardin, presented a talk titled “Understanding Mushrooms” to a standing room only audience that afternoon at the Chetco Activity Center. Georgia Nowlin, who attended the talk, described his presentation as “both approachable and informative in explaining the science of mycology in a way which made it fun and enjoyable.”
Dr. Desjardin grew up in the Crescent City area; he became interested in mushrooms as a young child, exploring the mushroom-rich forests of Northern California with his parents. It was those childhood memories that prompted him to agree to speak at this inaugural festival.
Dr. Desjardin presents to a standing room only audience.
How it all got started:
The Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival was organized by members of the Wild Rivers Mushroom Club. Established in 2003, The Wild Rivers Mushroom Club is a nonprofit group of approximately 60 amateur mushroom enthusiasts who convene monthly to share their love of all things mushroom. The group also offers training in local mushroom identification and sponsors workshops and events during the mushroom harvesting season.
The Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival was originally the inspiration of Kathleen Dickson. Kathleen brought the idea to the Wild Rivers Mushroom Club, and her enthusiasm for the project quickly rubbed off on other members. The group formed a committee of about 20 people to organize the event, with each person responsible for a piece of the festival, such as venue, raffle and silent auctions, marketing, and food. Kirsten Anderson took on the role of organizer. The committee was thoughtful in the scheduling of the event, placing it during prime Chanterelle season on the Southern Oregon Coast, but also ensuring that it did not conflict with the popular Yachats Mushroom Festival in late October, nor the Humboldt Mushroom Fair in mid-November.
Festival-goers examine local mushroom samples, while volunteers answer questions.
The volunteers who made it happen:
The driving force behind the success of the Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival was the volunteers who donated countless hours, knowledge, and their passion for local mushrooms. An estimated 40-50 people volunteered to bring the festival to life. Many were already members of the Wild Rivers Mushroom Club, but others who were not members were nevertheless excited about the project and came to offer their help.
One of these volunteers was Elizabeth Gronert, a volunteer through the Rural Area Revitalization Effort (RARE) working with the Oregon Coast Visitors Association. “Elizabeth knew we were kind of new at organizing an event such as this,” Kathleen said, “so she emailed me one day with an offer to help us with our Facebook campaign…AND show up the day of the festival to do whatever we needed her to do – including taking pictures!” Kathleen continued, “Elizabeth was a huge help – as were countless others who just showed up and offer their time and talents. We couldn’t have done this without our volunteers.”
One of the nicest things about the Mushroom Festival was the great artwork that accompanied all the club’s PR material. “Richard Wickstrom, a member of the Wild Rivers Mushroom Club and a retired graphics artist, created the initial artwork. The club liked it so much, we decided to make it our ‘official’ Festival logo!” Kathleen remarked. “It’s just another example of how much time and talent was freely given in order to make this event happen!”
Festival flyer with artwork by volunteer Richard Wickstrom.
The generosity of the community:
Organizations and businesses in the region donated generously to the Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival, and that support made a huge difference when it came to not only funding this year’s inaugural festival, but also in raising money for future festivals.
The Tourism Promotion Advisory Committee (TPAC) from the City of Brookings awarded the organizers a $2000 grant to get them started on the project. Over $3000 dollars in goods and services were donated from business as far north as Gold Beach and as far south as Klamath. Items such as jet boat rides on both the Rogue AND Klamath Rivers; overnight stays at both Lucky Seven Casino AND Requa Inn in Klamath; newspaper subscriptions; gift baskets from various merchants; gift certificates at practically every restaurant in town; all these things and more lined the tables for the silent auction and raffle, and helped make it possible for the Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival to happen again in 2018!
A sample of the items generously donated for raffle and auction.
Other organizations jumped on board to help promote the event: The Oregon Coast Visitors Association (OCVA) funded advertising for the festival and Travel Oregon helped promote the event. AllCare featured the festival in their monthly newsletter, and the Kalmiopsis Audubon Society promoted it throughout Curry County. The Curry Coastal Pilot did pre and post-event stories. OSU Extension Master Food Preservers held a workshop where participants learned about dehydrating mushrooms. Mycology societies throughout the state of Oregon helped to promote the event on their websites, Facebook pages, and with their media contacts. The Cascade Mycological Society in Eugene even sent some items for the raffle.
The festival organizers were overwhelmed by the generosity of the community, and made sure to publicly thank the many generous businesses who helped make the festival such a success with an advertisement in the Curry Coastal Pilot.
Plans for the future:
The Wild Rivers Mushroom Club has plans to hold the festival again next year. After paying off approximately $4000 in expenses, they are even carrying $2000 from this year’s festival into the festival next year. Next year, they hope to add an additional day and new activities to the festival. The group has also added 30 new members to the club!
A sample of Cauliflower Mushroom on display at the Chetco Grange.
Lessons learned and tips for other organizations:
We asked event organizer, Kathleen Dickson, if she had any advice for other groups who might be organizing an event like this. Here is what she said:
⇒ Make sure you start planning way in advance! Our club started working on the 2017 event in April, but that left us scrambling a bit when October rolled around. For 2018, we expect to start planning in January…
⇒ Create committees to handle specific tasks, like a committee just to gather raffle items, or a committee just to handle the venue layout. This helps spread the work around, and helps avoid volunteer burn out. And make sure there’s more than one person per committee – a minimum of 3 people works well. We had about 20 core volunteers attached to approximately six different committees, and about 30 more volunteers who pitched in here and there.
⇒ When someone asks if they can help, say YES! For instance, at one point, we thought we’d overdone it by having so many volunteers handling the many bits and pieces, but if we’d told anyone, “no, we don’t need you,” we would have ended up short-handed when the day of the Festival rolled around!
About Wild Rivers Connect:
Wild Rivers Connect provides networking opportunities and resources for nonprofits in Curry and Del Norte Counties. The Wild Rivers Mushroom Club has a listing on the Wild Rivers Connect (WRC) website. They used the WRC events calendar, WRC Facebook page, and Nonprofit Leaders Luncheons to help promote the Wild Rivers Mushroom Festival. If you have questions about how WRC can help your nonprofit organization, please contact us.
A sample on display at the Chetco Grange.
Photo Credit: Elizabeth Gronert
