Last night, Night Market Cleveland announced that the 2018 season, which was scheduled for monthly events through September, was canceled due to lack of funding and physical infrastructure issues among other things.
In a post to their official Facebook page, the organizers of the popular Asiatown event stated that nearly all of their vendor tents were damaged from poor weather conditions, and a lack of funds to replace or repair the equipment forced the event to limit vendor participation. Unfortunately, less vendors meant less funding revenue to keep the event afloat.
Night Market Cleveland recently launched a crowdfunding campaign to assist with the financial hardships, but fell short of their projected goal, causing the event to be canceled. Night Market Cleveland became a 501(c)3 nonprofit in May 2018, and the event had a new challenge this year of ensuring enough space for more than 200 retail and food vendors along with 40 bands and performers, as NMC has officially outgrown its current physical location on Rockwell Avenue.
The good news is that the Night Market Cleveland team is already hard at work building "windmills" for their 5th Year Anniversary season in 2019. Tentative dates for the 2019 NMC season are as follows: June 28, July 26, August 30 and September 27.
You can check out their full statement on 2018's season cancellation below:
