A brief history of the Welsh Fruit Festival…

Some of you will know about this already, but some of you are completely new (welcome… we are so happy to have you here!!), and so I thought I would take a moment to explain how the Welsh Fruit Festival has come about.

I set up U-Turn Health in 2023 with a view to offering online coaching, courses, and possibly retreats relating to the low fat, high raw, plant-based (aka fruit-based raw vegan) diet for health and wellbeing.

The UK Fruitfest has been running for the last 12 years, organised by the fabulous visionary Ronnie Smith. I have been to this event six times (my first was in 2019), and in 2024 I also had the great opportunity to go to the Woodstock Fruit Festival in Florida.

Sadly in 2025, Ronnie announced that he would not be running a festival in 2026. He has not currently said anything about whether he intends to start running festivals again, but he has said that he feels it would be better for people to organise smaller, more local events instead of big festivals in the future.

For myself, and for many other people, this news came as a bit of a shock. The festival has been a lifeline for lots of us, and especially for those of us who live in places where there aren’t many other raw vegans. Although local groups have started meeting in London, there are a lot of people who for one reason or another can’t get to these.

Personally I feel that the festival can act as a central hub, allowing people to meet each other and start to form connections that may result in smaller and more local activities throughout the year. The festival shouldn’t be a single one-off event and then we all go home and forget about each other for the next 357 days.

This is why I have set up the FROOTEE Community on Mighty Networks. The festival is only one part of a bigger picture in terms of how we move forwards to build community and support each other on our respective raw or high raw, vegan or plant-based paths.

So, after Ronnie made his announcement, I offered to run a festival instead under the U-Turn Health umbrella. I had already been to visit Trigonos and knew I liked it, but we looked at some other possible venues before deciding to go with them: and we were very lucky to get a space because they are usually fully booked more than a year ahead. They did juggle some other clients around to squeeze us in!

This is my first time running a festival, and it’s already been a very steep learning curve. I am sure there will be a lot more learning as the thing unfolds!! However, I have to say that I have ABSOLUTELY LOVED EVERY MINUTE of this new venture in my life! I am committed to making the Welsh Fruit Festival 2026 the very best event it can possibly be, and to continuing to run events in the future if that is something people continue to want and need.