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Published on 06/29/1998 All articles from this issue

Survey shows festival-goers love the event

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By Joanne Griffith Domingue / Town Crier Staff Writer

A survey of folks at last year's Arts & Wine Festival brought good news to festival sponsors: 90 percent said they loved it just the way it was.

Liz Zoltan, who helped design and implement the survey, said folks were "extremely flattering to the festival."

Zoltan, dean of the business and social sciences division of Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, worked with the Los Altos Village Association to design the questionnaire used the day of last year's festival.

And Foothill students posed the questions.

Several interesting things turned up.

"The younger crowd - 20-year-olds - they loved the people watching," Zoltan said. And when asked how to improve the festival, they said, "get more good looking people to show up."

Not that good looking people didn't show up - just get more, they said.

Also, older folks asked for more shady places to sit, Zoltan said.

The survey showed that people come from all over to the festival, and they come back, Zoltan said.

This year Foothill students will be doing another survey of those attending the festival. And this year it will be part of a one-credit course for the students.

Because "we know this festival is very family oriented - you can tell by the number of strollers," said Kathleen Byrne, director of the Village Association, there will be students stationed in the KIDZONE to specifically get feedback from the families there.

Also, building on information gleaned from last year's questions, some additional information will be sought this year.

"The questions will focus more on downtown businesses," Byrne said. Last year the answers showed that people will return to Los Altos downtown. This year students will be asking, "Why will they come back - what shops, restaurants will they be visiting? We will get more specific, so our business owners can use this information," Byrne said.

Art is the favorite part of the festival, food second and wine third.

Other Foothill faculty working on the survey with Zoltan, include Lois McCarty, a sociologist; Larry Rouse, a psychologist; and Bill Thompson, with the business faculty.

"It always makes me smile to see the numbers who say they will be returning," Byrne said.

This year's 19th annual Arts & Wine Festival will be in downtown Los Altos on Saturday and Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.