Festival offers food, fundraising for films
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Minot Food Truck Festival is celebrating its 10-year anniversary on Aug. 30 while continuing to raise funds for ND Strong, a nonprofit program dedicated to providing hands-on film education and resources to K-12 and college students in North Dakota at no cost.
The festival will be from 11 a.m.-6 p.m. and includes more than 20 food trucks, live entertainment, arts and crafts, vendors and a 5K run the morning of the event.
Created by Matthew Maldonado and Eric Thoemke, both graduates of Minot State University, the nonprofit, ND Strong reaches into communities through its subsidiary, The Film Dudes. The organization travels across the state, teaching students at various academic levels about filmmaking while bringing arts into the school system through video production curriculum.
The goal of the organization is to "educate and inspire students about film making," according to The Film Dudes information. ND Strong additionally writes, directs and produces short and feature-length films, holds premieres for local film makers and offers sponsorships to North Dakota residents for their film projects.
When speaking of the creation of the Minot Food Truck Festival, Thoemke explained they were wanting to bring something fun and creative to the community to fundraise for their program. They were inspired by events in other cities and wanted to bring the festival to the neighborhood.
"We were looking for something fun to bring to Minot and it felt like a good opportunity to raise money," Thoemke said. "At the time, no one was really doing food trucks here in Minot, but we looked at what other cities were doing, like Chicago, Minneapolis, and saw that these festivals had gone over well, so we decided to bring it to Minot."
Looking back on the festivals, which have grown every year, Thoemke recalled their expectations during the first festival.
"The first year we were only expecting about 500 people to show up, and then 5,000 showed our first year," Thoemke said. "Going into our 10-year anniversary, people look forward to it every year."
The money raised during the festival will go toward travel and program costs for The Film Dudes to ensure there is no cost to schools for providing students with hands-on filmmaking experience. Festival admission will be available at the gate on the day of the event.