Night markets stay home

Last Friday should have been one of the busiest evenings in the Orange calendar with thousand of people filling Robertson Park to kick off the 2020 F.O.O.D. Week celebrations.

Although public gatherings have become a thing of the past due to the coronavirus pandemic, it didn’t stop locals marking the occasion — just from their own homes.

The Night Market @ Home was an initiative of Orange360, a way to encourage people to support our local food and wine businesses that are doing it tough in these trying times.

“The Night markets are always such a fantastic community-focused event, and so popular with local families, we thought this would be a perfect time to give people the opportunity to come together, virtually, and reconnect over something that is so treasured and loved by the Orange community,” said Orange360 communications manager Emily Mann.

“And there's a lot of Orange businesses who are hurting at the moment, but who have done amazing things within their businesses to adapt on the fly and remodel their business in this new and challenging environment.”

To take part in the virtual event, people were encouraged to order takeaway food from one of our local restaurants or cafes, then take advantage of the amazing food, wine and spirits on our doorstep and share their meal on social media.

“Lots of people sat around the dinner table to do that. Myself and my family we set up a picnic blanket in the backyard and lit the fire pit and we all participated online using the hashtag #nightmarketathome so that people could see what others were doing and feel connected to them virtually because we couldn't all be there together in Robertson Park,” said Emily, who is planning further online events to support our local retailers as well and food and wine vendors.

“I think it was a really successful event it was a good test case for us we are working towards developing some other online events, not only for locals, but for fans and followers and lovers of the Orange region moving forward.”

Although it is a difficult time for everyone, Emily said it has heartening to see local operators banding together to help each other out…

“If there is one good thing to come out of this whole catastrophe is seeing how innovative our local businesses can be and seeing businesses support one another,” she said.

“And to see the support from the local community who are really rallying behind all of these operators and making sure they are shopping local, giving a shoutout on social media, telling their friends and families to make sure they are supporting and spending their hard-earned dollars with local guys... It is really inspiring to see the compassion amongst our community.”