Summer 2022 – Looking back at a busy show season

It’s been a record breaking summer here in Wales, with some record breaking high temperatures during various heatwaves throughout the summer. But for us here at Dragon it’s been great to be back in full swing attending summer shows and food festivals and getting to see all our customers face to face again.

Our season started up north at Caernarfon Food Festival on the 14^th May, it was a lovely sunny Saturday with crowds hitting 50,000 at the one day Food Festival that takes over this scenic historic town. We were very busy on our stand all day overlooking the picturesque Caernarfon Marina. This Festival was a sign of things to come for us as we then prepared to head over to Llanelwedd for the Spring Festival.

The Royal Welsh Spring Festival was held on the 21^st and 22^nd May, attracting many visitors to the showground over the weekend. This spring show celebrates rural life and country pursuit sports and activities, with livestock and equine competitions, trade stands, displays, activities and food and drink. It was a fun two days and good to be back exhibiting at the Royal Welsh Showground.

On the 30^th June we attended the International Cheese awards held on the Staffordshire Showground, followed by the two day Love Cheese Live Event. The International Cheese Awards brings together cheese makers from across world to celebrate some of the best cheeses in the industry, it attracts over 4,500 entries. Love Cheese Live is held over two days following the Awards, it is a Food and Drink Show with many food and drink trade stands, and Celebrity Chef cooking demonstrations, it’s a great show to be a part of and see the best of industry together at one event celebrating the hard work that goes into producing some of the best cheeses and produce.

A highlight of any Welsh company’s calendar is the Royal Welsh Show. This year saw the show return after the pandemic and with scorching heat predicted it was definitely going to be a show to remember. Our team were very excited to be back in a busy Royal Welsh Food Hall again and we had a fully stocked fridge and our stand ready to go! The heatwave didn’t deter visitors too much to the show with a busy four days at a record-breaking hot show, it was definitely great to be back at the show and to return home having won the Supreme Butter award was a bonus for us.

There has definitely been a hot theme for our show season this year with another few days of hot weather forecast for the Anglesey Show, with our stand set-up and our fridge stocked we were ready to welcome everyone for the two-day show. At the Anglesey Show we also take some time to have a catch up with our Farmer Members, with the sun shining for both days of the show it was great to catch up with everyone and meet returning and new customers.

The following week our team prepared to head to the Flint and Denbigh Show, this one day agricultural show has a lovely family friendly feel and we were again ready to welcome our customers and farmer member to our stand. We had a very welcome breeze at the show and the rain stayed away for most of the day.

Our busy show season for 2022 came to an end as we attended the Abergavenny Food Festival, it is a two day event that takes over this pretty Monmouthshire town and showcases all shapes and sizes of food companies from bakery goods to cheeses. The sun was shining for once again and it was a busy and successful two days for us. It was lovely to end the summer with such popular food festival and we’re looking forward to doing this all again next year!