First Fridays Farewell

Hi folks!

We hope you are doing well and staying healthy. We sure have missed seeing your lovely faces these past 2 years! We are reaching out to let you know some sad news, but also an exciting announcement.

During the COVID pandemic, the City of Xenia was able to re-evaluate how they approach events and are excited to take more of an active leadership role in coordinating events for the community. Enter the sad news... First Fridays, as we are used to seeing it, will be coming to an end. We know this is a hard one to swallow BUT, the exciting news is, in First Fridays place, the City of Xenia will be hosting some type of quarterly events and are actively working on getting these up and running. We are super excited to see where the City of Xenia takes this idea and hope you will continue to come out and show your support! Ryan Baker and Christina Schaefer at the city will be heading this initiative and we think they will do great things!

An e-mail and phone number has been set up at the city for event inquiries:This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  Phone: 937.665.0160

A web page on the city's site with additional event information can be found here: City Events Page

We want to thank each and every one of you for a wonderful 12-year ride! We were able to build some pretty tremendous relationships over the years and through those, give back to our community so we thank you for that. Every sponsor, volunteer, city worker, city admin, downtown merchant, vendor, local business, community club, food truck, hired contractor, entertainer and attendee played such an awesome role in the success we have seen over 12 years. We appreciate you more than you know! With your support and positive energy, First Fridays went from an idea with 3 downtown shops staying open in 2009 to 4 street closures, 81 passionate vendors, 23 exciting downtown shop specials, 9 amazing entertainers, 11 awesome attractions and a BOAT LOAD OF COMMUNITY PRIDE at our last event in 2019. You all make us smile!

Blair, Heidi and past volunteers can't thank you enough for how amazing you have been to work with and the positivity you brought not only to our events, but the City of Xenia as a whole.

Here's to keeping Xenia moving forward and cheers to a new chapter!
#xeniaproud

Blair Davis & Heidi Hilderbrandt

First Fridays Team
Blair Davis & Heidi Hilderbrandt, Event Coordinators