MOOSE JAW — This year’s Sidewalk Days Festival was expected to be the largest ever, and while the newly formed committee said no hard numbers are available to confirm it, steady crowds, sold-out vendor spots and strong feedback from vendors all point to yes.
“It’s really difficult to count the amount of people down there,” said Everley Reid, a member of this year’s Sidewalk Days committee and sales and creative co-ordinator at Tourism Moose Jaw. “But based on what I saw — and I’ve worked on Sidewalk Days for several years now — it was very busy at all times.
“I would say we had at least as many (attendees) as previous years, if not more ... I think we could probably safely say that we had a better turnout than previous years,” she added. In 2024, 22,000 unique visitors were estimated to have attended the festival.
This year’s downtown festival ran from July 3 to 5 and featured 249 vendors spread across nine blocks of Main Street North. Sweltering temperatures hitting 36 degrees Celsius marked Thursday and cooled to 25 degrees on Friday, but festivalgoers still came out in large numbers. Cloudy skies and haze on Saturday offered some relief, helping to maintain a steady stream of visitors until closing at 5 p.m.
“Actually, I heard from someone that Thursday was their busiest day, which I thought was crazy because the weather was so awful,” Reid said. “But people still came out, even in the 36 degree weather, which is awesome to see.”
Fuelled by a broader “shop local” tourism trend, the event marked a strong follow-through on predictions made earlier this summer. In June, Tourism Moose Jaw had reported increased visitor numbers and a shift in travel habits, with more Canadians staying close to home and avoiding international trips — especially to the United States.
Several vendors told organizers that 2025 was their best Sidewalk Days event in terms of sales, providing further evidence to support the largest-ever festival claim.
“One vendor said that it was her third year at Sidewalk Days, and she had made more sales than she ever has before,” said Reid. “Devo’s Dogs said that they had done like two or three times (the amount of sales) they had done (in previous years).”
This year’s Battle of the Bands, sponsored by Water Vision Pools & Spas, featured several strong performances and concluded with fan-voted winners Out of Frequency taking the top prize with For Now placing second. Phoenix and the Silver Voodoo placed third. The winning band received a $1,500 cash prize, a 45-minute performance set, and full bragging rights.
Behind the scenes, this year’s festival was also a major milestone for another reason: it was the first event organized by a mostly new volunteer committee. Only Reid and a few returning board members including Rick McKeown and Matt Brewer had previous experience helping organize the festival.
“It was a year of kind of getting our feet wet and figuring out what exactly we had to do as a new committee,” she said. “Now that we know more, I think next year we’re ready to come back and do an even better job.”
The committee included executive director Donna Fritzke — who took over the role on Jan. 1 — alongside Daniela Quiroz, Catherine Guillaume-Eberle, and support from Tourism Moose Jaw board members Rick McKeown and Matt Brewer. Shannon Simpson and the “Helping Hands” crew from the Downtown Moose Jaw Association also played a major role, helping with setup, teardown, stage transitions and more.
“It really is thanks to the help of people who volunteered their time that we had such an awesome festival,” Reid said.
