Taste of Minnesota festival pulls up stakes for good

A Taste of Minnesota is folding.

Linda Maddox, the summer festival's general manager, announced the closing and her retirement on Thursday via the event's Facebook page. Her declaration would appear to put an end to the once-thriving annual celebration, which got its start in St. Paul in 1983 and has been held in Waconia the last two years. Maddox's late husband, Ron, was one of festival's founders.

News that the July 4th festival is ending took its entertainment director by surprise. "Don't count it out," said Jack Koshick.

The festival, which once drew about 200,000 people a year, attracted about 80,000 people in 2014, when flooding forced the festival to move from St. Paul's Harriet Island to Waconia. Koshick said he didn't know what attendance was last year, when a long detour around road construction in the west metro area deterred some visitors.

Maddox couldn't be reached for comment Thursday night.

A Taste of Minnesota died once before, only to be resurrected three years later. In 2009, new owners took over the festival, but their attempt to revive it failed, and in 2010, they filed for bankruptcy. Linda Maddox brought the festival back to life in 2014.

But the festival's best days seemed to have passed, said concert promoter Randy Levy. Minnesota's short summers are now jam-packed with festivals and music venues such as the Basilica Block Party and Rock the Garden, in addition to the 12-day State Fair, he said.

"You go to Rock the Garden because it's the Walker Art Center. You go to Soundset because there are cars and guys spinning on their heads," Levy said. "There's a whole environment and culture there. Taste of Minnesota didn't even generate the best barbecue and blues show."

But in its heyday, A Taste of Minnesota was in a class by itself, Levy said. "People went because there were lots of different restaurants and beer and bands," he said. "It was free and had lots of sponsors."

But that changed, he said, adding, "With the amount of competition, there was no driving reason for people to make that part of their entertainment circle any longer."

Ron Maddox, along with Dick Broeker, launched A Taste of Minnesota as a celebration for families that didn't have summer cabins to go to. The pair got their inspiration from a festival in Chicago. Eventually, the Minnesota celebration moved from the State Capitol grounds to Harriet Island, and then to Waconia.

Residents and officials in the west metro area said they're sad about losing the festival, which brought droves of people to the Carver County town.

Koshick, who has overseen entertainment for A Taste of Minnesota for two decades, said the festival may be out for 2016, but he's hoping he and others can revive it for 2017.

Levy called Waconia a wonderful place, but said that to survive, the festival probably would have to move closer to Minneapolis and St. Paul.

"The Taste of Minnesota has been an institution for over 30 years," Levy said. "Times change. I think [the event] can be reinvented. Well, that's the plan."