First Summer Wine Walk in Windsor draws a sold-out crowd

Despite the downpour of rain and flash flood warnings, the first-ever Summer Wine Walk in downtown Windsor kicked off on Friday evening to a sold-out crowd.

The event, hosted by the Windsor Chamber of Commerce and the Windsor Downtown Development Authority, DDA, maxed out at 500 attendees.

Attendees began their journey at a registration tent at 529 Main St. where they received a printed keepsake wine glass and a swag bag filled with goodies from some of the wine walk’s 23 participating businesses such as Hayden Outdoors Real Estate, AEI Studio and Gifts, Suite C Salon and Manweiler Appliance.

The event was a great way to connect downtown businesses with the community and prospective customers.

“This is probably the most people that have ever been in my store,” said Pamela Tallon, owner of AEI Studio and Gifts at 503 Main St. “I want people to discover my store. I have this tiny little store, and I’ve been here six years. And I still have people walking in and saying, ‘How long have you been here?’ I want people to get to know it and see what I have to offer.”

While the event was a first for the town, it wasn’t Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Michelle Vance’s first venture at organizing such an event.

“This is my 13th wine walk I’ve done. I used to work for a community for 20 years, and I did all the community events for the town. So now, I am bringing what I did there to Windsor,” Vance said. “It’s been an amazing, crazy, cool downtown awesome event.”

Participating businesses on the walk were provided bottles of wines from the chamber and DDA to offer walkers and no two participating businesses offered the same wine.

“As the chamber, we are business advocates. We are now bringing our businesses to residents and that’s their customer,” Vance explained. “And what better way than by doing community events.”

The chamber and DDA purchased all the wine for the event from Toast Coffee and Wine Bar, 205 4th St., and attendees could sample up to 10 different wines on the tour.

“Most wine drinkers like a certain varietal of wine — red wine, white wine, bubbles, whatever — and so you go and pick where you want to go,” Vance said. “We got a special use permit and liquor license for the event.”

Pinot grigio, pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon and merlots were some of the wines featured on the tour, hailing from vineyards located in the western U.S. like California, Washington and Colorado, as well as some wines from Italy, Spain and France.

If you missed the Summer Wine Walk, the chamber and DDA have already set plans in motion to host an Ugly Sweater Wine Walk on Shop Small Saturday on Nov. 27, as well as a Valentine’s Day themed wine walk that will pair wine with chocolate truffles.

Money raised from Friday’s event will go to the chamber to help them continue to promote local businesses in the town.

For more information on upcoming wine walks or other events, go to www.windsorchamber.net or www.windsordda.com.