 This is Dennis McMahon and welcome to Positively Vermont. And today, my guest is Stefan Tetro, the co-chair of the forthcoming Vermont Maple Festival. Welcome, Stefan. Hi, Dennis. And we're gonna be speaking today in advance of this. And one of the things that I've been doing this year on Positively Vermont is focusing on some events, but trying to focus far in advance so that people will see it soon enough so they can participate and make plans for it, maybe even get accommodations and also work with festival organizers to see how they can help. So first of all, Stefan, tell us a little bit about yourself. Well, I'm a born and bred Vermonter, raised in Fairfield, just a few miles out of St. Albans. And I grew up on a family dairy farm, was not a sugar maker growing up. My dad was, but then when the kids, we came along, he continued to work the dairy and not the maple side. So I got into maple through my neighbors, all my neighbors, sugar. It's a seal brand in my co-chair. I worked for them off and on when I was younger in high school. And many others. So, you know, I threw that through those folks. I found the love of maple and then started in 94, I think it was, started on my own in my family's sugar woods. Now I own it all. And it's my operation with my family and my best friend that helps me out. And then through all the connections I've made over the years in maple, I've been on the Franklin County Sugar Makers Association Board as a member and officer. I've been on the Vermont Sugar Makers Association as a delegate and a board member for quite a while. For quite a while. And then I left that when Cecile Brandon asked me to join the festival in a larger, you know, larger way than just a member of the board. She asked me to be co-chair and I slept with that. I had to let something go. So I dropped the VMSMA at that point and that was probably close to 10 years ago now when I became co-chair with her and we've been doing it since but I've been involved with maple in different aspects for quite a while now. That's great. Well, tell our viewers a little bit about the maple industry, what it involves and what are the products. I know people are familiar with maple syrup but there's other items. So give us an overview of that if you would, please. Yeah, sure. There's so many different things that maple can be used for. There's so many, like you said, value added products. There's maple mustards, there's maple, you know vinegars and dressings, not to count out just the normal things that folks see with maple syrup, you know, like maple cream, maple candy, you know, those kinds of things, you know if you're a devout coffee drinker and you put sugar in your coffee every morning, switch it up, use maple syrup instead. It's good for all of us. So that's what I do. And then, you know, then maple has got a huge impact on everybody around. You know, you think of it, you know sugaring is the way you always thought of it. You know, horses and a team of horses with a sap sled behind it, a pile of buckets and men running through the woods, gathering, you know, there's still some of that but in very small scale today, I believe. The big scale today is tubing, vacuum systems, you know, very large, not small to very large operations. My operation is a, I would say a small operation, 5,000 taps give or take compared to the neighbors or somewhere around 80,000 taps. And there's some that are even bigger in the area. So it's a lot of fun, a lot of work and it takes a lot of time, you know, not just, you know from the time you see steam rising from the woods or the sugar houses, it's a year round project for all of us as sugar makers. What's the industry in the state and in the region? How large is it? How important is it to the welfare of the Vermont economy? Oh, it's huge. You know, the terrorism side of it, you know your maple creamy stands all summer long, you know when the festival comes into town here in St. Albans, you know, we promote it statewide, you know statewide and out of state across the border. And it goes, you know, we have people from all over the country, out in different countries that come and visit us. So, you know, that helps the restaurants, the hotels, you know, the whole nine yards, the major dealers the equipment dealers, there's one, two, three, four four of them right here in Franklin County. And they are, you know, they have their open houses the same weekend as the festival. So that brings in a whole another slew of folks from around the countryside to, you know one, they're buying equipment, you know maple equipment is not cheap, plain and simple. You know, so there's a huge impact, you know financially for that. And then the tourism side of it, you know with folks buying maple coming to see our beautiful trees in the fall when they're all lit up with color. There's so many different ways that maple helps, you know the small person who's selling at the roadside stand to the farmers markets to the online sellers to the bulk sellers, you know it's just, it's everywhere. It's a great, great way. Excellent. Well, we're recording this on March 6th and I wonder if you have any views on how it's been this year in terms of the production, the cycle the weather, how does that, have we had a good year or are we gonna have a good year? Well, we'll be able to tell you if we had a good year toward the end of April. It has, we have had some very productive weather for those who were ready earlier on there was some syrup made in January, syrup made in February, there actually was a fair amount made not too long ago in February. So a lot of producers are, you know maybe ahead of the game, but it's really hard to tell until those final numbers roll in about around festival time we usually know what kind of season we've had when the festival rolls in the end of April. Okay. Well, this is the 56th years of the celebration. Yes, I believe so. We missed a couple just because of COVID, but yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about the history of how this got started? Well, it got started, of course, 50 odd years ago and there was some ramshackle shacks that they put together in Taylor Park and it was done during March during the height of sugar and season versus end of April back then. So they, you know, they had all kinds of weather and they would pack it in and do it up. You know, folks just wanted to promote, you know the first maple, the first agricultural crop of Vermont every year and that's how it got its feet, you know and then from there it has just expanded over the years where, you know, we're doing tours, we're doing, you know, product demonstrations those kind of things, you know to try to educate folks on, you know, where maple is and how to get at what you can do with it. They're just endless. That's amazing. Well, tell us a little bit about the festival is going to be starting April 28th, 29th and 30th and tell us a little bit about what the run-up to the festival is involved. What are you going to be doing between now and then and what can people expect? Yeah, so our board meets once a month. We take a few months off during the summer but we start planning, basically we start planning right after the previous festival gets done. We have a couple of meetings, follow-ups, wrap-ups what can we do to improve those kind of things and then we take a couple of months off but there's always in the back of your head that you're thinking of, well, what can we do? You know, what can we bring in for entertainment for folks while they're here visiting us? What can we do to make it better for the vendors, the businesses in town? You know, we try to work with everybody. Are we going to make everybody happy? Not a chance, but we're going to try to make at least somebody happy. But there is a lot of planning, a lot of advertising. You know, we've got our board of 12 or so, 15 and a slew of volunteers once the festival gets here and they all do this before their love of Maple and you know, there's nobody's getting paid for this. We all take our own time from work. You know, there's, and it's a lot of time advertising, you know, and especially right now that's the big one right now is getting our advertising up and running and the brochure which I had sent you getting that ready to go to publication. And you can see by the looks of that brochure there's a lot of things in that brochure that have to get lined up prior to this being printed. You know, Sugar House tours, entertainment for the stage, the vendors and you know, there's just so many things. There's, we could go on all day about it. That's great. We're going to put the website in the video vtmaplefestival.org and there's all kinds of information on that. And let's go through some of the events. First of all, it's going to be in Taylor Park. The hub is Taylor Park. There'll be, you know, a lot of some maple treats in the park. There's, you know, you're kind of your normal food vendors along the main street. And then we have our exhibit hall which is in the parish hall just above the park. Used to be in the high school and but we moved it over to the parish hall for this year, this first year there. You know, that's where the products, the cooking contest, all the maple syrup entries are shown off and, you know, for the winners and whatnot. There'll be maple cotton candy available, maple cream glazed donuts, maple creamies, you know, syrup tasting in the park. Yeah, so there's a lot going on. And then of course we have the craft show, the antique show which also start on Friday. And then there's, you know, everything and everything is free for those, there's only a few paid items and that's, you know, the talent show tickets or the fiddlers show tickets on Saturday night. The pancake breakfast is a paid item which that's back now after a couple of year hiatus. So yeah, you know, so then it, go ahead. Well, let me ask you this maple exhibit hall, that's the parish hall you were talking about. Yes. What's the name of that church? The St. Mary's Parish Hall. Yes. And that's where all the indoor activities are. That's the indoor for that. And then of course we have the craft show which is in the BFA high school gymnasium, the antique show which is in the St. Albans town educational school gymnasium. The pancake breakfast is at the St. Albans city school gymnasium or cafeteria. And, you know, a lot of these items were kind of nixed the last couple of years because of, you know, what's been happening. And thankfully the schools have led us back in for this year so we can put a normal, what we call a normal festival, full bore. We're gonna have everything there. Well, last time you had it, how many people attended the approximately? Over the, That's a tough, tough question to answer. But I would say over the weekend, not counting, you know, our folks and volunteers, I would say there's gotta be somewhere between 20 and 60,000 people that come to St. Albans over the weekend. You know, between the parade on Sunday, you know, and then just coming to see the entertainment, the entertainment, the mainstream entertainment is just great. Definitely when you, these folks go and look at our website, there's all this entertainment on the stage. It's all free. You know, if it's a nice day, the sunshine and there'll be chairs there they can sit. If it's not so nice today, well, maybe bring an umbrella and a blanket. That's great. Because Now you mentioned it, tell us a little bit about what the entertainment is gonna be provided on the Main Street stage there. Sure, sure. So on the Main Street stage, let's see here, I've got my cheat sheet with me. Well, we'll just jump on Saturday for example, you know, in the morning, the local electric youth dance company right there in St. Albans, they're gonna perform on stage. And then after them, the talent show, which is on Friday night, the winners from the talent show will perform on the Main Street stage after around 1130. Then there's a youth rock band, the Kingdom All-Stars, which will perform early afternoon. And then at four o'clock, 8084, which is a very well-known band in this area, Northern Vermont, they're gonna be playing. So that should be a great show. And we, you know, we have a lot of different folks. So on Friday afternoon, for example, there's a No Shoes Nation Band, it's a Kenny Chesney tribute band, they're gonna play. So there's a lot going on, you know, we all start, it all starts out with our opening ceremonies at noon on Friday at the Main Street stage. So if you like maple and milk, they go together real well, we have a little maple and milk toast on while we do our opening ceremonies. That's great. And tell us about the parade that's going on. Yeah, the parade down Sunday. So we have the parade on Sunday, which is at noon. It starts down on the southern end of the town, and then it comes through the city. And there's somewhere between, oh, I don't know, 80 to 120 entries, if not more or less, it depends. If it's an election year, sometimes there is an awful lot of politicians walking into the parade, which is fine. But yeah, so yeah, they have a good parade. And while you're watching the parade, you can have your fried dough or your maple brownie or maple donut or your maple creamy, you know, there's a lot of maple cotton candy or other things that are out there as well. That's great. Are there gonna be any bands participating in the parade or things like fire trucks and things that kids might like? Yeah, there's always a few bands, a few high school bands. There's the piping, the bagpipe band that usually is always here. Again, their name escapes me at the moment, but that's all right. So yes, there are some bands in the parade and a lot of fire trucks usually so we try to have the entrance, all the rest of the entries are, there's a theme for the festival every year. This year it's maple, the heart of Vermont. So they try to theme their float or their entry towards that. And they're judged and somebody's gonna win the best whoever matched up to the theme the best. They'll win, there'll be a first, second and third. So when that, yep. Tell us a little bit about the products itself. Is there's gonna be competition kind of an awards based upon the products involved? Yes. So there's quite a few products. So there's the maple syrup products. So you have your golden delicate which used to be the fancy grade, your amber grade and then the dark robust grade. So we have, folks can enter one category or all three and those are judged for flavor, density and clarity. And then based on those items, the panel of judges will pick out their top, let's say in the golden delicate class, there's 25 entries. They'll pick the top 10 for example that which are outstanding in that class. And out of that, they'll pick the best of class. And the same thing happens in the other two grades. And they also, then they'll take the three best and then they have to pick out best of show. And they do the same thing with maple sugar, maple cream. They'll have maple fudge. Oh, there's quite a few. I'd have to look it all up, but there's, the judges have quite a sweet tooth by the end of the day, I'm sure. That sounds great. Yeah. And then there's a cooking contest as well where they cook with maple, there's different, you know, there's like preserves, pickles, cakes, cookies, healthy, healthy things with maple. And again, I'm probably, I'm forgetting a few, but I'm gonna try to cover the ones I can remember. It's great, because we, let's go big on the site and people can look up things that they wanna follow up on what you wanna tell us about. Now this, is there a craft and specialty part of this where people exhibit their crafts? I see something here about that. Tell us about that. Yeah, the craft show, which is at the BFA High School Gymnasium. That is all three days. And yes, it's full of crafters. And last I knew there was still a couple of spaces left. So if there are crafters out there that wanna join the festival this year, they could reach out to the website and then reach out to our craft show chair, Michelle, and she'll hook you up. But yeah, there's a little bit of everything in there. And that's at the Bellows Free Academy, BFA. Yes, Bellows Free Academy, the high school. Excellent. What are maple crafts? What are we talking about? What are maple crafts? What are those? Well, there might be artwork that's made out of a, you know, maple leaves carved out of a maple log with the old tapholes in them, or there's a vendor that's looking to come in. I don't know if he's gonna come or not, where he makes, you know, like light lights that you can put on the wall out of old sap buckets. And he cuts, you know, a design in those. There's just, yeah, there's a lot of different things, what they could do, you know, some folks make birdhouses out of old maple jugs, you know, things like that. That's great. Is there going to be like industry kind of exhibits, manufacturers or companies that deal with the business in? Yeah, and those are more at the dealers. So the, you know, the big dealers around, you know, leader evaporator, H2O, which they have joined forces, CDL, Dominion Grimm and LaPierre, those dealers all generally have their open house at their facilities all weekend on Saturday, Friday and Saturday or Saturday, Sunday. And, you know, sugar makers from all over the regions come to those open houses. That's great. Well, I don't want to pin you to this because it's on the website, but you do have a lot of sponsors, people who are participating in this. I know it's difficult sometimes to remember them all, but they are on the site. But if you want to say something about the people who make this possible. Well, there is, yeah, there is a lot of sponsors. And like you said, there's no way that we could put this show on and have it all free for folks without all these sponsors. You know, we have from like People's Trust, the five maple dealers that I just mentioned to you, Vermont Federal Credit Union, Handy Chevrolet, Toyota and Handys Downtown, Channel 3 WCAX, Viatris, there is just so many of them. Let me see who else I can think of. And then, you know, WOKO and the radio stations around, you know, and then we have, you know, some smaller ones. These are all different size sponsors, you know, from $100 up to $5,000. So it really ranges, you know, Clarence Brown Fuels, Vermont Maple Sugar Makers Association. You know, small businesses like OC McEwen and Southern Highgate, Disorci's Market, Maple Fields, you know, and then of course we have a lot of the lodging places around as well. And most of these sponsors, you know, they have a love for Maple, you know, wherever it be, be it an insurance agent like Kenny Insurance or Cooperative Insurance, you know, these have all been long-time standing sponsors. And we always try to pick up a new one here or there elsewhere. And, you know, my gosh, you know, when you go to one of these sponsors down, thank you for helping the Maple Festival because without them we, I don't know how we do it. That's great. And they're all listed on the website. They're all listed on the website and they're also listed in the brochure, which the welcome centers should have our brochures and the vendors or the sponsors will be getting their brochures. So we just had those, the final printing just came in and they were picked up. So they're starting to work their way out into these locations. So yeah. That's great. I just wanna ask a couple more things. Tell us about this art show that's part of it. The art show. So yeah, it's a combination art photography where, you know, it can be, you know, folks can just like anything else, just like the Maple products. So you can enter a painting that's Maple related and there's quite a few different categories which are listed again on the website. I'm not up on that too much, but there's generally like, you know, landscape pic photos, those kind of things. So yeah. That's great. And what about concessions? They're gonna be places where people can buy things, I guess, cards and souvenirs and things like that. Yeah. The Maple festival itself has its own concession, so to speak, where we sell Maple products, you know, syrup value-added products, candies, creams, those kind of things, barbecue sauces, there's just so many T-shirts and it's kind of similar to the shirt I have on today. Oh, that's great. Festival. It's a Vermont Maple. That's great. That's great. So, you know, there's always those we have, that'll be available in the exhibit hall and also on the main street store that we have. So those are the two for us and there are other folks around, you know, that the at the craft show and whatnot would have some other, you know, drinkits or whatnot that you could pick up as well. Well, finally, let me ask you a little bit about kids entertainment. I know there's plenty through the adults, but what kind of kids entertainment is it gonna be? Yeah. So yeah, we have, you know, different entertainment for the kids. We have what they call them a Dragon Man, the fire show in the park. That is Jason Tardy. He does four shows on Saturday in the park. And then we also have the Aim High Canines, which is another free show in the park, which was really received quite well. And then at the BFA Performing Arts Center on Saturday, the kids program is Yo-Jo, what a guy. He's a kind of a master of a lot of different tricks that young people enjoy. I've actually sat down and watched him and he's quite fun to watch. He has three shows on Saturday at the Performing Arts Center. And then let's see what else. And there's face painting for the kids at different locations throughout the craft show, at the exhibit hall, down in the park, we'll have a tent where they do some face painting as well. And then there's a few rides as well for kids, which would be, we were hoping to have our full ride package back this year. And we just got noticed last week that we'll have our rides in the park as we had the last couple of festivals, but our big set of rides that we usually have down by the core house will not be here this year, unfortunately, but that's a way it goes sometimes. Well, this really sounds very exciting. And I wanna refer to the website and the brochure, which is gonna be available soon about the Vermont Maple Festival, and we're getting near the end. And maybe, Stephanie, you can just give people a parting shot, a welcome or anything you wanna say to conclude us this morning. Yeah, we love to have folks come to this festival. I've been a bus tour to the sugar houses, which we haven't covered. We do a sugar house tour on Saturday to two different locations. We're going to the Horgan family in Fairfield to their sugar house, which is a new sugar house they built a couple of years ago, and also to John Johnson's, which is also in Sheldon, just outside of Fairfield, which is a fairly new place as well. And when you go on these tours and you meet folks from, I've meeting people from South America, Australia, all over the country, all over the world, as well as folks around here. And it's just, the best part is just to be able to visit with these folks because they have a love for Maple, that's why they're here, or they wanna learn about it. And I'd like to invite people because how are you gonna learn if you don't come and see what's happening? You know, if we could do bus tours all day long, it would be great, but it, excuse me, just like anything else, it takes time to get tour guides, buses, locations, and locations this time of year in April that the buses can actually get to. Okay, well, that's great. And I just wanna thank our guest here today, Stefan Tatro, co-chair of the Vermont Maple Festival, coming up in beautiful St. Albans, April 28th, 29th, and 30th. And thank you very much, Stefan, and thank you for your committee and Cecil and everybody who's doing all this wonderful work, the Heart of Vermont, Maple the Heart of Vermont. That's a wonderful slogan for this year. Thank you very much. And this has been Dennis McMahon for Positively Vermont. Thank you for watching.