Cathedral City Hot Air Balloon Festival Was A Huge Success!
More than 6,000 people enjoyed the inaugural Cathedral City Hot Air Balloon Festival this weekend with 4,000 out of the 6,000 coming on Saturday evening for the beautiful and free Balloon Glow, the free outdoor Disney movie, “Up”, the Sunset Wine Dinner, Gourmet Food Trucks, and LIVE bands including Cathedral City’s own, “Avenida Band”. It was a magical evening and a vista of balloons not to have been missed!
This event was also an economic boom for our downtown. Bonta Restaurant & Bar reported their highest grossing sales and the most customers they have ever had in one day. Trilussa Restaurant was sold out days in advance with over 300 reservations. This is extremely important as events like these helps keep these businesses strong and our downtown vibrant!
The Sunset Wine Dinner was also sold out several days prior with 184 paying guests and many, many more wanting tickets. The Dinner had reservations from people coming in from San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles to enjoy the entire evening. The gourmet food trucks and the Theater Square Market vendors had excellent sales too. Grandpa’s Ice Cream, for the first time ever, sold his inventory in one day!
The Desert Sun reported that all hotels were sold out throughout the entire Coachella Valley this weekend unlike ever before due to so many great events. The Balloon Festival played a role in bringing out of town tourism dollars to our Valley.
It takes and took a village to make an event a success. Thanks should be given to our City Council, City Staff, Fantasy Balloon Flights, all the balloon pilots and crews from 4 states, and the hundreds of dedicated volunteers from our Rotaries, Cathedral City and Rancho Mirage high school students, and a lengthy list of very supportive residents living in our great city! Thanks should also go to our gourmet food trucks that provided more than 180 meals for our volunteers.
Finally, thank you for coming downtown and supporting this inaugural event and all the merchants doing business here in Cathedral City!
