Friday, May 3 will mark the return of First Fridays in downtown Wright City this summer. The monthly events are put on by the Wright City Downtown Revitalization Committee which was founded in 2020 and held their first events in 2021. 

The group started with the goal of bringing people, and businesses back to downtown Wright City and since the event's inception they now expect between 1,500 and 2,000 people to fill the streets for First Fridays. 

“So we established the organization in order to bring awareness to the downtown district and in the hopes of getting people excited about seeing renovations down here and so we created the First Fridays just to bring people down to the downtown area,” Committee Member Kelly Hill said. 

The events include food vendors and performances from local bands as well as the opportunity to shop, eat and drink in the city’s downtown district. The events are free to attend although they will have to purchase items like food from vendors. 

The May 3 event, like each of the others this year, comes with a theme; Cinco De Mayo. 

The theme will come with plenty of additional events and attractions including a hispanic band, a pinata and the salsa showdown for chefs looking to prove their recipe is the best. With the theme the celebration is shaping up well, committee member and Wright City Alderman Ramiz Hakim said earlier in the month that they are aiming to fill downtown Wright City’s streets with up to 70 vendors. 

“Right now we’re at 50 vendors, we’re shooting for 70,” Hakim said. “We’ve got a couple weeks, usually the last two weeks is the one that really pushes.”

Committee members were also excited about an announcement for the headliner of the June 7 First Friday event who was voted on by community members on Facebook. Hill confirmed that they have hired Drawl STL, a premiere country cover band, to play June 7 for First Fridays. 

The other two events the 4th of July and Back to School Bash in August will finish out the summer’s events for the committee.