Te Puke events set to take off with book launch and ethnic food festival

Te Puke Events and Promotions Group committee member Stuart Gunn says it would kick-start a new series of events with the launch of Karena and Kasey Bird's second book in October. PHOTO/JOHN BORREN

Ignite, inspire and galvanise is the motto behind a new group that plans to promote Te Puke with different events - which will kick start with the launch of Karena and Kasey Bird's second cookbook and an ethnic food festival.

Details of the culinary book were under wraps but Te Puke Events and Promotions committee member Stuart Gunn said it was an opportunity too good to miss which would showcase town and the iconic Maketu chefs.

Mr Gunn, the owner of Te Puke Paper Plus, said the Bird sisters approached him following the launch of their first book at the store which was a great success.

That encouraged the group to think about running an activity alongside it on October 15, he said.

''We thought about a food festival because about 28 per cent of our community are ethnic or people from other cultures. Now we are trying to get around schools, businesses and not for profit organisations to take part.''

''They would produce a food from somewhere around the world and sit outside the shops down the Main Street... and then that organisation could benefit from that.''

The group had evolved from Shop Te Puke over the last four months, Mr Gunn said and ''it's morphed into something quite a bit bigger''.

''Shop Te Puke was very much a Main Street thing and suddenly we had other people interested so we looked at widening it to create events.''

The group had secured funding from the Western Bay District Council, hired a marketing manager and released new branding under EPIC Te Puke.

''EPIC can stand for anything because we can play on the letters like E for entertain or P for perform. We are coming up with some neat ideas and hope to do four events a year, which is exciting.''

Te Puke Economic Development Group managing director Mark Boyle said it was supportive of the group and it would work alongside them.

''They will be of considerable value to Te Puke and the fact they are doing a multi culture food festival is a winner. And securing Karena and Kasey is a real stellar move as they are on the global stage now.''