Floydfest kicks off with several local businesses as vendors

Festival organizers say 50 percent of staff are also from Floyd County

FLOYD COUNTY, Va. – One of Southwest Virginia's biggest music festivals kicked off this evening. The 15th annual Floyd Fest will run until Monday of next week. It's expected to draw more than 15,000 people to Floyd County during that time.

It's a highly anticipated party for thousands across the country every year, but for people who live in the Town of Floyd, with a population under 500, it's even more exciting.

"It's the biggest time of the year, besides Christmas of course," said Jessica Messer, who works for Red Rooster Coffee in Floyd.

She says this weekend, they're devoting everything to the festival.

"We pretty much bring our entire staff out here for the entire weekend," said Messer.

Floydfest organizers say that kind of local participation isn't unusual.

"This staff that we have here is almost 50 percent Floyd residents. These people help make this and build this city every year. It does really take a village," said Sam Calhoun, with Crossway Productions, the company that puts on Floydfest every year.

Messer says they're here because it brings in more money than any other time of the year. In just one weekend here at Floydfest, Red Rooster Coffee goes through five one hundred pound buckets of coffee just like this one.

"It's pretty crazy how much coffee we sell. Usually we have to go back into town by like day three and go roast more coffee because we run out pretty quickly," said Messer.

With more than 15 thousand expected to enjoy the music and artwork, Floydfest is working harder to accommodate the crowds.

"We have more shuttles than ever this year, running people back from our off-site lots to here. We have more golf-cart shuttles to get people around site, more tractors to get people's gear in, so I think we're getting better and better in this boutique atmosphere," said Calhoun.

That ease of access is what will help keep businesses like Messer's, and the 400 other vendors, profitable year after year.