Restaurants Awarded for Good Taste

The announced that the following restaurants have received awards for their outstanding contributions during the 2012 Taste for Douglasville Arts:

Most sold – Red Lobster

Best Presentation –

Best New Restaurant – Iron Horse Station

Better Choice Award –

This year the weather was perfect all day long in historic downtown Douglasville, and CAC’s nineteenth Taste of Douglasville broke all previous attendance records with more than 16,000 people enjoying the festival throughout the day. Clearly, the Taste of Douglasville remains the largest and most popular event in Douglas County–and this year it was also the first major tobacco-free event in our community.

There were eighteen participating restaurants including five new restaurants as well as old favorites like Sam and Rosco’s, , , and ; seven restaurants sold more than 1,000 tickets of food with coming in second and Cold Stone Creamery third in the most sold competition. More arts and crafts vendors participated than ever before; and the new addition of the Better Living Market proved a sold-out success with 30 booths promoting healthy activities and products to large crowds. There were also two stages of local talent, great activities for children, and a wonderful array of sponsors’ booths filling to capacity.

“We were especially delighted this year for our nineteenth annual Taste of Douglasville to offer a historic first–the first tobacco-free Taste–and to emphasize the Cultural Arts Council’s commitment to building a healthier, active and engaged community through the arts, not just with the first tobacco-free event in our community but also through our new Better Living Market and the new Better Choice Award for healthy dishes for the restaurants,” commented CAC director Laura Lieberman.

“We were also pleased that our two new national partnerships from last year-“Above the Influence” offered terrific interactive fun in their anti-drug campaign targeting 13-to-16-year-olds, an initiative brought to our community by Amanda Bryant of C.O.R.E., and the U.S. Tennis Association’s “quickstart,” which set up a kid-sized tennis court and gave children 10 and under free tennis lessons introducing them to this great healthy sport–participated again this year, supporting our emphasis on healthy behaviors.”

She continued, “Our sponsors this year also helped the Art Council with increased promotion and marketing–WSB promoted Taste on its web site and with more great radio advertising, even though we missed Captain Herb, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Douglas County Sentinel both developed and distributed terrific inserts on Taste again this year, produced and cablecast a wonderful feature previewing Taste, and the and the promoted our event in many effective ways; the Chamber also helped us promote both Taste of Douglasville and our festival kickoff, the Picnic on the Plaza. I am sure this all helped make the 2012 event our biggest and most popular ever. Of course, the beautiful weather helped too.”

First established as a fundraising event for the Cultural Arts Council by Rhonda Case, former director of the , the Taste of Douglasville festival is the result of thousands of hours of work on the part of hundreds of people in our community every year. This year more than 300 volunteers were involved including: CAC Board members who hosted our second annual festival kick off with Picnic on the Plaza, Friday, May 18, a lovely and very popular party with great jazz performances by singer Myrna Clayton and the West Side Winds Jazz Ensemble led by Dr. Asa Walker and delicious picnic fare catered by Sam & Rosco’s; all of the talented individuals who performed on the O'Neal Plaza stage under CAC’s Programming Committee member and Surf Fest founder Wayne Foster’s direction with CAC Board President Jerry Leath as Master of Ceremonies and on the Second Stage coordinated by Iteeah Pounds with County Commissioner Henry Mitchell as Master of Ceremonies and City Councilman Samuel Davis contributing technical production; and especially our 2012 event co-chairs, Omar Daniel and CAC Board member Renee Kell, and our honorary co-chairs, Sherry Persons and Linda Worthan. 

Kevin Livingston and his 4-H group volunteers raised money for their activities with our new second drink stand by the Second Stage where many of them also showcased their talents throughout the afternoon, while the Douglasville Bulls, a college level summer baseball team, sold drinks donated by Coca Cola Enterprises, on O’Neal Plaza.

“We are so grateful to everyone who worked so hard to make this Taste of Douglasville an outstanding success,” stated CAC Board President Jerry Leath. “Their generosity means so much to the Cultural Arts Council and to the community we serve. The funds raised support cultural programming and arts activities throughout the year. And didn’t we all-all 16,000 of us this year-have a really wonderful time together?  What a great day!”