In light of the present Covid situation, with non essential shops opening today and hotels, pubs etc foreseen as able to open from July 4th I am preparing a very provisional program for Shefford Newsline August issue – on the basis of:

“possible events in the case that we are  able to go ahead, do not assume they will happen – please check in local media nearer the time”

– with that in mind would anybody considering an activity or event for the festival at the end of September please let me have a description of your idea by the end of June, with the date you envisage so that at least you get some early publicity.

We can then refine the program as things become clearer with help from  our good friends at LivingLife and with use of our own website and social media presentations right up to the last minute. Please see the registrations page here.

Hi everybody – we are seeing some gradual lifting of Covid restrictions – and looking at other countries who are slightly ahead of us it looks quite possible that we may be able to run a “new normal” – socially distanced festival in September. As you may remember Shefford Newsline is a major communication channel for the program – as they kindly publish the program in their August issue – so I am working to a deadline of the end of June to put a provisional listing together. Obviously this will be on the basis that events will only run if they meet guidelines – and if the guidelines permit the Festival to run overall – otherwise we will have to cancel it. However I believe that it is worth preparing for the best even if we do have to cancel at the last minute – it is my hope that the odds are in our favour.

A good example is the flowering of interest in a Garage Sale Trail event – so many homes have been cleared out and de-cluttered! Likewise I am encouraged by the gathering linkage of recovery with climate and other green issues – we have managed to come together to deal with the pandemic – let’s do the same for community issues like global warming and the environment.  Of course Festival events may need to be spaced out and number limited but I suspect that by September we will be accustomed to these adjustments and will be able to enjoy ourselves in safety.

Please let me know details of your event – either by email to [email protected]  or by registering on the website at https://www.sheffordcommunityfestival.co.uk/registration/

Look for news updates on the website at  https://www.sheffordcommunityfestival.co.uk/ and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/sheffordcommunityfestival/ 

Also at Shefford and Local Villages https://www.facebook.com/sheffordandlocalvillages/

All best for your health and that of our families.

Ian Deavin

Clearly the whole situation of public events is up in the air at the moment so the likely occurrence of our September Festival is in doubt – although if all goes well then it could be a “welcome back to normality” celebration – we shall see. As organisers we would welcome news of any planned events – there are one or two that ran last year that I am not yet aware of for this year – so please if you have thought of re-running your activity please let me know otherwise we could all get caught out when the brakes come off. If they don’t come off in time for the September Festival then we can review to postpone until later in 2020 or sometime in Spring possibly. There are also one or two newly planned events that I am aware of which are probably on hold – again please keep me up to date so we can be prepared.

Festival program – as usual I am working to a deadline of the end of June for August publication in Shefford Newsline  – and then to update it on the website and with support from LivingLife as event notifications come through. Getting your event into August publication obviously gives you a head start so, if you can please let me have basic information asap – by e-mail or by registering on the website https://www.sheffordcommunityfestival.co.uk/

With best wishes for good health to all – Ian Deavin – Organiser [email protected]

With best wishes for continued good health

Ian

After last year’s Festival the main suggestion we had  was to put more street decoration in town, so that when driving/walking through it would be obvious the the festival is taking place. We thought this was a really good idea so we reached out to Shefford Town Council who agreed to look into placing banners on the High Street – and we reached out in turn to the Shefford Lights Committee for advice and help re positioning of larger banners, like the one we previously had on Shefford House.

I am delighted that the Lights Committee responded completely positively and we are now working with them to place banners in the centre of town where they are used to hanging Christmas lights. Our plan is to place large banners on the three main routes into the centre of town so they will be obvious to anybody heading in from Ampthill, Hitchin or Bedford directions  before they enter the High Street itself where we hope they will see decoration by the Council.

So far I have been in discussion with seven private and business owners and have been so well received , it was amazing the community spirit they expressed – all were entirely welcoming of the suggestion that we hang a banner on their building – all verbally agreed and one signed a permission straight away so I now have just to tie up the admin with the others.

Participation

We are headed towards our third Shefford Community Festival this September 19 – 27 – it is very encouraging (and an indication of the increasing popularity of the festival) that we already have a couple of activities planned for the afternoon of Friday 18 as lead-in events – so the more the merrier. Thanks to the enthusiasm of our participants last year we had an excellent festival and are now looking forward to an even better one in 2020 with your help.

This year again we anticipate the EAT Feast street food fayre, Prince and Princess Day, Art Exhibition, Bowls club competition, garage sale trail, hopefully the Pop-up-Circus, a full week of events at St Michaels, a history of Shefford presentation, with many daytime and evening activities around the town. We are presently talking to other organisations about new signature events and are hopeful of seeing involvement from core community groups such as the schools and the STMA, as well as a number of completely new participants and signature events to put us properly “on the map”.

So if you would like to run a themed evening, offer a Shefford cocktail, provide a taster experience, promote a local community activity or anything else then please let me know – you can e-mail or register on the website at https://www.sheffordcommunityfestival.co.uk/registration/ – then when you run your event please use the festival logo in your publicity.

As usual our friends at Shefford Newsline have offered support by publishing the Festival Programme in their August issue in order to reach every household in Shefford, but in order for us to collate this and provide it to them we need your registrations by mid-June. Information received after that will of course still be used on our website and social media etc

Perhaps the most common feedback we got from last year was regarding the need for more street decoration and with help from the council, some experienced volunteers and a number of high street businesses we hope to install a lot more banners, so that the festival is more prominent as people pass through the town.

Sponsorship

The way the festival is set up means that costs have been kept very low and are spread across all the events making it essentially free to the community at large. Many events have no additional cost at all and as organisers we do not charge for the admin, co-ordination, marketing, social media promotion and facilitation.  It is a wonderfully efficient festival – organisation has been kept to a minimum with a small amount of private funds and voluntary administration seeding it’s establishment. However, as the festival grows we anticipate needing to spend money on things like street decoration, publicity materials and related services – interestingly this year we have been contacted by a prospective outside sponsor. Previous efforts to raise funds locally by donation sadly were not successful so we will investigate the sponsorship model and ask anybody who would like to be involved to please contact me so we can discuss ideas – for example presence on banners, on leaflets, on our website in the social media and so forth.  The aim of a sponsorship approach of course will be to benefit both parties – the sponsoring company and the town of Shefford by virtue of a more inclusive and more extensive festival.

Typically we would expect that local companies would benefit most from sponsoring but there are also good arguments for regional organisations to sponsor as a route to a higher profile in the town.

We tend to hear bad news first and at highest volume – like the problems of our youth in the high street – so it was especially heartening to learn a wonderful balancing story while chatting over a coffee at The White Hart the other day. I was wondering about the the tables and chairs outside the White Hart only to learn that they are left in peace – so to it appears are the picnic tables outside The Loft. Long may it last that Shefford continues as a civilised place and let those of us who are involved in promoting community spirit also continue to encourage the best in community behaviour so we can all enjoy being here. As we move into the New Year of 2020 this is a good time to think of what you could do to participate in the Community Festival in September – just come up with an idea to join all the many other activities and notify us on the website here.

Once again the Christmas lights committee have done a sparkling job of brightening up our high street – we wish them a merry Christmas and are ourselves planning for the 2020 Festival in September – what will you do to participate in nine months time?

Let us know  by registering your activity on our website and downloading the logo to use in your own publicity.

We are delighted to once again be supporting the Community with a Christmas Tree on display with many others at St Michael’s Church. Many thanks to A. Jakins & Sons for donating the tree.

The Tree Festival is open on Friday 29th November at 10.45am after the Friday Morning Service, when children from Shefford Lower School will be singing, until 4pm with refreshments served all day.

The Festival will be opened officially at 10.00am on Saturday 30th November by the Shefford Gala Prince and Princesses. Refreshments will be served in the Church on the Saturday from 10.00am until 5pm and on the Sunday from 11.30am until 3.30pm. There will be a Festival Service to end this weekend at 4pm. All donations made over the 3 days will be split between the Church Funds and Motor Neurone Disease Association.

The Winter issue of Shefford Newsline – Edition 99 is packed full of Community Festival related material starting with the cover depicting the History Group Model Railway display plus inside spread showing what the bridge area used to look like.  We have reviews of the Prince and Princess Fun Day, a review of the festival as a whole – with apologies from me if your event was missed – and a piece covering the Library “What’s On” event.

News just in – I am told that the very successful street food fayre will be repeated next year with additional appearances – so check the 8th May, 4th July and 26th September for 2020.

You can read it here on the council website.