Thousands enjoy first day of Downtown Fargo Street Fair

FARGO, N.D. (KVRR) — The Downtown Fargo Street Fair is officially underway and the community is loving it so far!

“If you can look around here, just the people next to me and the people around me, there are hundreds of vendors and they all offer these unique things. There’s people from Africa, there’s people from South America, there are people who handmake things right here. So, it’s a place where we can support each other, come together as a community and just all come together and enjoy it,” said Carol Simmons, the founder of Real Good Bath & Body.

“The reason I’ve been coming for about 10-15 years to this Fargo Street Fair is because it rivals other big shows around the country. Chicago, Minneapolis, New York City, I’ve done them all over the country and I wouldn’t be coming back if it wasn’t so great. They do a wonderful job and pack it out. I mean, everyday it’s just solid people and good people here, too. It’s just a pleasure to keep coming back,” said Darinda Hoke, a caricature artist from Missouri.

Eight straight blocks of vendors from food and drinks to arts and crafts and much more in between.

“Burgers, fries, pizzas, fruit, slushies, corndogs, yummy,” said Kailani DeVisser.

Some are celebrating special milestones during this year’s downtown Fargo Street Fair.

“Well, I suppose it’s our 27th anniversary today. So, how do we celebrate it? We go to the street fair. I can’t think of a better way, right? Get some popcorn and some cheese curds and we’ll call that an anniversary dinner,” said Bob Ward.

Others found themselves at the fair in the middle of their tour across the United States.

“Our goal is to get the kids to all fifty states by the time they’re eighteen. This will put us about halfway. Twenty five hundred miles and here we are at the middle of Fargo at a local fair. It’s pretty awesome, said Jim DeVisser, who’s travling from Corpus Christi, Texas.

“We actually met the owner of the cafe in Jamestown who told us about the fair. He was saying he was coming up so we thought, ‘well, this is where we need to go.’ We might hit the zoo. The zoo? Maybe. The zoo! And maybe Bonanzaville,” says Kimberly DeVisser, who’s traveling from Corpus Christi, Texas.

Meanwhile, vendors are excited to network and be helpful resources for their community.

“It’s a lot of fun to see all the people that come out. We even get people from out of town. So, they get to see some fun, different stuff. It’s cool to see all of the different vendors that handmake all of their stuff, as well. That makes it a lot of fun and, yeah, just getting to talk to people. We help them with some of their plant-y questions because they happen to come up with some while they’re here,” said Madison Burm of the Sheywest Garden Center.

“We love the United States and a lot of people travel abroad. But there’s so much to see here. Why not take the opportunity to go see it ourselves, go see everything that America has to offer, Jim DeVisser said.

The street fair runs through Saturday so come on out and eat good food, buy some crafts, get your own caricature drawn and check out the live music at Broadway Square.

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