West Side Wednesday celebrates 1-year anniversary

Business owners on the West Side of South Bend are celebrating their efforts to revitalize the area and they want the community to be a part of it.

"West Side Wednesday" started last December. It started out as lunch meetings between business owners on the west side of the city.

Since the meetings gained so much popularity, they had to stop advertising the meetings because they were filling up an entire restaurant.

They decided to open up the celebration to the community. Last July, they had a festival to unite the city and it attracted thousands. It has changed the game for some of the local businesses.

“Ever since they re-did the sidewalks and the streets, it just made everything more friendly and more inviting and people are willing to come to this area,” said Julian Alcantar, a local artist and owner of Gallery 2910.

“It really helped out all of the businesses in the area. Our business in here helped to just get us going put us on the spotlight per say for that type of situation,” Alcantar said.

Since the festival impacted the businesses so positively, they are celebrating their one-year anniversary Wednesday afternoon. There will be a ‘West Side Wednesday’ lunch at Taqueria Chicago from 11 AM-2 PM.

On top of that, there will be a “Holidays on the West Side” festival on Saturday, December 10th from 12 PM-4 PM.

“We will have vendors inside of Gallery 2910 and people will be able to come through and look at the arts. There will be vendors for your Christmas gifts there will be produce as well. It’s all local handmade and it’s going to be a blast,” Alcantar said. 

You can find more information about Saturday's event here: https://www.facebook.com/events/353642024971679/