New Castle County Executive Tom Gordon (D) was among those trying to build buzz Tuesday morning for the annual Rockwood Ice Cream Festival later this month at Rockwood Park in North Wilmington.
Gordon says the two-day event June 28th and 29th is a great summertime showcase for the county and many of its businesses.
“What we get out of the event is we get a lot of families from New Castle County enjoying a day at Rockwood Park – to see this beautiful park. In addition to that, we get a lot of local vendors that get to show what their stuff is made out of," said Gordon "So we get a double pop out of it. We’re very proud.”
Barry Schlecker of Barry’s Events runs the festival in conjunction with New Castle County. Schlecker says he believes the ice cream festival is starting to hit its stride three years since being revived
“Last year on a beautiful Saturday like today’s weather, as I said we had 18,000 people in one day which means we have the potential to probably do 35,000 to 40,000. We can literally double the size of the show as far as attendance,” said Schlecker.
Schlecker notes that 95 percent of the nearly 90 vendors that have already signed on to be part of festival are Delaware-based – including the eight showing up to show off their ice cream.
Those dairies and ice cream vendors will also have a chance to compete head-to-head in the festival’s new “Best Sundae on Sunday“ contest.
Organizers also revealed Tuesday the event is slated to be featured on the upcoming Food Network show “Best of the Fests.”