This year’s Made in Hawaii Festival will include 70 exhibitors who are new to the show or returning after an absence.
What many attendees might not realize is that before any individual shopping gets done, wholesale buyers from Hawaii, the mainland and, this year, Canada will peruse the exhibits for business-to-business potential.
At least four Canadian companies will be checking out Made in Hawaii offerings this year.
Doyle Importation Inc. looks for processed goods including dried fruit, coffee, confectionaries and seafood for its food brokering and manufacturing agency, which sells about $500,000 in U.S. imports annually.
SJP International Consultants offers warehouse and direct-to-store distribution for retail and food-service companies throughout Canada. Buckstone Inc. markets affordable luxuries including apparel, garden supplies, jewelry, soaps, spa products and musical instruments; its estimated U.S. imports total $1 million.
Tony Waters Agencies is a distributor with a focus on natural and organic products and estimates $12 million in U.S. imports since its founding in 1991.
In addition to the festival’s "old salts," or longtime exhibitors, Aloha Spice Co. offerings from Kauai will include gourmet organic seasonings including coffee-spiked rubs, hibiscus and lilikoi sugars and no-salt seasonings.
Maui’s Clear Light Jewelry is handmade from natural, recycled mother-of-pearl shells as well as oil tints and pewter components, while Forbidden Island Flutes, also of Maui, will offer precision-tuned ocarinas in animal shapes.
From Hawaii island, Da Secret Sauce offerings include Hawaiian chili-pepper water that Rex Moribe makes from a recipe passed down through his family. Danielle Bolton’s HuluWuwu feather earrings and hair clips will accompany a new line of accessories made using preserved orchids.
And, you’ve gotta love the name: Filthy Farmgirl Soap Co., available at select stores on Oahu but based on the Big Island. It will bring its natural, vegan-friendly, handmade soaps, balms and lotions with outrageous names to the festival. A sure winner with the pre-apocalypse crowd: Filthy Zombie Soap.
Oahu’s new exhibitors will include Grandpa Dick’s Hawaiian Beef Jerky, in three flavors, using local beef and no preservatives; and Haute Sand Hawaii, which will show off its patent-pending process to apply sand on T-shirts in various keiki designs.
There are dozens more, which can be previewed via the Made in Hawaii Festival website.
As usual, musical performances by Na Hoku Hanohano Award-winning recording artists will be staged throughout the festival. Foodies will camp out in seats fronting the cooking demonstration area, also as usual, to catch performances by local chefs, who might hand out a morsel or two.
The 18th annual Made in Hawaii Festival at the Blaisdell Exhibition Hall and Arena will be open from Aug. 17 to 19. Hours are 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Aug. 17 and 18, and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Aug. 19.
Admission is $4 per person, though children 6 and under get in free. Coupons for $1 off admission will be available free at all Oahu First Hawaiian Bank branches beginning in mid-August, while supplies last.
Speaking as a regular attendee who knows this from experience: Comfortable footwear is crucial.
On the Net:
» www.madeinhawaii festival.com/default.aspx
Another Fieri find
Tonight’s "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" at 7 p.m. on the Food Network will follow energetic host Guy Fieri to joints including Camille’s on Wheels, where he’ll taste the touted fare of the popular food truck. The episode is titled "Coast to Coast Chow."
The July 30 episode will spotlight Heeia Kea Pier General Store & Deli, also a popular new hang on the Windward side.
As colleague Joleen Oshiro reported July 12, Heeia chef Mark Noguchi, considered by many a leader in the culinary locavore movement, has since left the business to start his own venture.
On the Net:
» www.foodnetwork.com/diners-drive-ins-and-dives/index.html
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Reach Erika Engle at 529-4303, erika@staradvertiser.com or on Twitter as @erikaengle.
