A Wisconsin beer festival that brings more than brewers from across the region and beer fans from around the world has been canceled for 2020 due to the coronavirus.
The Great Taste of the Midwest in Madison was scheduled for Aug. 8.
The Great Taste is Wisconsin’s premier beer event, attracting nearly 200 brewers and thousands of visitors, volunteers and brewery staff to picturesque Olin Park on the shore of Lake Monona.
“It is difficult to envision that we could safely gather in a group of 10,000 people in August, and the current health crisis compels us to make the tough decision to suspend planning efforts,” Great Taste of the Midwest Chairman Jason Walters said.
The nonprofit festival, staged by the Madison Homebrewers and Tasters Guild every year since 1987, is the second-longest-running beer festival in the United States. It features dozens of breweries that usually don’t send beer to Wisconsin, and over the last several years, a night of unticketed, open-to-the-public beer events at Madison bars and restaurants has developed as well.
Tickets for the festival normally go on sale on the first Sunday in May at a handful of locations in the Madison area, drawing revelrous crowds of overnight campers aiming to spend $60 each on a pair of the 6,400 tickets available. That stage of the event had already been called off and replaced with an expansion of the festival’s secondary ticketing option, a mail-in lottery.
“We’re all really disappointed to cancel such a long-running Madison event this year but we know it’s the right thing to do.” Walters said, thanking the patrons, brewers, volunteers and staff who were planning to attend. “We’ll look forward to celebrating together next year.”
