Longmont Restaurant Week has become a tradition that businesses and the community look forward to each year. Event organizer Jennifer Ferguson, hopes the event encourages people to try something new.
The week-long celebration was formerly run by the Longmont Chamber of Commerce. As the Chamber moves away from event planning and into local advocacy, it wanted to find the perfect home for Restaurant Week.
Ferguson, local entrepreneur and owner of Wonder Tours — a tour bus shuttle that highlights local restaurants — decided to take up the opportunity to tackle Restaurant Week.
“I think being an independent organization will help us make some quick pivots that need to be made versus being a larger organization,” Ferguson said.
Ferguson said a few things will change under her leadership. Historically, the event has run in October, however, the event is currently scheduled for Feb. 18-28.
This change was made after Ferguson assembled an advisory committee to assess what the community's needs were. She discovered that restaurants struggle the most with sales in February. Ferguson wanted to make sure the week would be a great benefit to the restaurants in their slowest time.
“The whole intent of a Restaurant Week is to get people to patronize restaurants when they need it,” she said.
This year Ferguson is making a big push to include all food-related businesses from coffee shops and breweries to fine dining restaurants. She said there will be some of what customers expect from Longmont Restaurant Week such as some fixed pricing but there will also be more options.
To get people more excited about Restaurant Week and some of the participating restaurants, Ferguson is hosting a tasting event in November.
For Ferguson, Longmont Restaurant Week should become an event akin to Art Walk or the Winter Walkabout. She hopes to create more events around the week and offer some new choices for customers including a coupon book that will extend Restaurant Week offerings beyond the February date.
Correction: Original dates have been corrected.
