DENVER (KDVR) — Denver’s annual Cinco de Mayo Festival is canceled this year due to the coronavirus, but now some vendors say the organizer is refusing to refund their full entry fee of nearly $2,000.
The sweet sizzle of deep-fried food and shrieks of joy from children on the carnival rides – these are the sights and sounds that that make up Bill Rudel’s world.
“You’re around people who are there to have a good time. That’s what I enjoy,” Rudel said.
Rudel owns B&M Innovative Concessions with help from his girlfriend, Sabrina Miller. The two were looking forward to setting up shop as food vendors at Denver’s Cinco de Mayo Festival. But similar to other events in Denver, the festival was canceled because of COVID-19. However, Rudel already paid his entry fee in January, of $1,925 with an early-bird discount that brought the total to $1,875.
“That’s a lot of my money on the line,” Rudel said.
Rudel said he signed a contract and paid NEWSED Community Development Corporation, the host of the Cinco de Mayo Festival, through credit card. After they canceled the event, NEWSED emailed Rudel to offer him a partial refund, which he declined as he wanted the full amount back.
“They said they’re a nonprofit organization and they had already spent the money,” Sabrina Miller said.
FOX31: “Spent it on what? The festival isn’t happening.”
Rudel: “Yeah, I don’t understand”
The Problem Solvers reached out to the CEO of NEWSED – who provided a lengthy statement that says in part, “NEWSED cannot refund the full amount” and “NEWSED CDC offered Mr. Rudel a 20 percent refund of his base fee. Mr. Rudel disputed his refund and won through the credit card processing system.”
But Rudel has yet to see any of that money and questions why his experience with NEWSED has been so challenging, when other events he was scheduled for this year automatically returned his entry free.
“We’ve had Country Jam and other shows that did refund our money without issue at all. In fact, this is the only one who hasn’t so far.”
Rudel said because the money he paid up front to NEWSED has not yet been returned to his bank account, his back is up against the wall to pay employees and try to keep his business afloat.
“To have them cancel and not refund me, it’s bankruptcy ultimately, if it continues.”
NEWSED CDC’s full statement:
“NEWSED CDC offered Mr. Rudel a 20% refund of his base fee and a full refund of his clean up deposit and electricity fee. His total refund was to be $625. Mr. Rudel disputed his refund and won through the credit card processing system. It is unclear to us why Mr. Rudel has not received his refund and we encourage him to reach out to his bank to research the matter. NEWSED CDC’s refund offering is in accordance to the policy that was developed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the State and City public order forcing any gatherings over 10 people to cancel through May 11th. The event does not have a policy written or otherwise or anything written in the vendor contract as Mr. Rudel states, “if the organizer must cancel the event – vendors will be issued a full-refund.” That statement is a complete untruth. Mr. Rudel will not have to pay sales tax on the event since it is not happening. Also most food vendors purchase licensing directly through the fire department and/or health department to be able to operate at any and all events, but we are unsure of what Mr. Rudel had to pay or if he has requested a refund for those fees since the event was canceled. We would encourage Mr. Rudel to reach out to those agencies to request a refund. It has never been the organization’s responsibility to cover those fees for individual businesses.
As the producer of the Cinco de Mayo Festival, NEWSED Community Development Corporation is a nonprofit 501(c)3 charitable organization. The Cinco de Mayo is an extremely important event that allows NEWSED to fulfill its mission which is, to promote the economic success of underserved populations in the seven-county Denver metro area through community development with a focus on affordable housing, small businesses and asset creation. NEWSED’s work has been very instrumental in creating opportunities for adult self-sufficiency in the City of Denver for 47 years.
In planning for the Cinco de Mayo imagine an iceberg. The festival is the top of the iceberg that you can see above the water, but the majority of the iceberg below the water, is the pre-planning. The preplanning for a festival consists of the behind the scenes work that takes a lot of our time and funds that are received through vendor and sponsor fees prior to the day of the festival. The Cinco de Mayo’s preplanning consists of three main teams working in unison to bring everything together. Those teams are sponsor procurement, event production and media outreach. Regardless of this cancelation, the majority of work to produce the festival had already been done by the time we received the order to cancel the event in March.
In these unprecedented times, many individuals, families, businesses and nonprofits are experiencing some level of difficulty and/or hardship. We can add NEWSED to that list as the loss of this festival, makes up half of our annual operating budget, which will have a large impact. While NEWSED cannot refund the full amount, we did offer the following: 100% of clean up deposits, 100% of electricity fees and 20% of the total base fee. We have already issued these refunds back to the credit cards of the vendors who paid. If they paid by check, the refund was mailed to the address we have on file. As an additional concession, we also offered a 10% discount for next year’s registration. In addition the amounts we are unable to refund can be written off on their 2020 taxes since we are a 501(c)3. Letters for their contribution have already been mailed.
We thank you for your understanding.”
