Depot Day set for Oct. 10; vendor applications due Sept. 18

The Gainesville Area Chamber of Commerce will hold Depot Day on Saturday, Oct. 10, at the Gainesville Farmers Market. Anyone who wants a booth has until 5 p.m. Friday, Sept. 18, to apply. Admission is free, according to the chamber's event listing.

The festival runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 215 W. Elm St., the listing says. The chamber's festival page promotes an auto show with more than 200 vehicles.

The chamber counts this as Depot Day's 39th year. By the organizer's own estimate, the festival brings in about 10,000 people from around the region.

Most sellers will pay a little over $100 for a booth, according to the chamber's 2026 vendor application. Nonprofits that show proof of their status pay less. Vendors whom the chamber approves have until Sept. 25 to pay. A vendor who misses that date gives up the space.

| Vendor terms | 2026 Depot Day |

|---|---|

| Application deadline | Sept. 18, 5 p.m. |

| Payment deadline for approved vendors | Sept. 25 |

| Trade space, 10 by 10 feet | $110 |

| Trade space, 20 by 10 feet | $165 |

| Nonprofit space, 10 by 10 feet, proof required | $75 |

| Information booths | Limit of 18, not counting sponsorship booths |

Sellers who work the market under annual city contracts have an extra step. The application lists Depot Day as a blackout date for those contracts. To take part, those vendors must register with the chamber and pay it separately. The chamber also says it will put no booths under the market pavilion.

If weather forces a delay, the festival moves to Saturday, Nov. 7. The application gives that decision to Gainesville's Emergency Management Team and the chamber's board.

Gainesville's comprehensive plan dates the chamber's first Depot Day to the 1980s. The chamber says the festival traditionally falls on the second Saturday in October. Last year the city calendar listed the 38th annual Depot Day for Oct. 11, with the same hours and free admission set for this year.

City records connect the festival to trade in town. Gainesville's adopted budget for fiscal 2019 put attendance at the previous Depot Day near 9,500. The same budget reported that local restaurants and hotels filled up during the event.

The city has sought state help with the festival before. According to minutes of the Aug. 5, 2008, meeting, the City Council voted 6-0, with one member absent, to apply to the Texas Department of Agriculture's GO TEXAN Rural Community Bootstrap Bucks program. The application named Depot Day as the event for tourism-promotion help. The minutes do not say whether the state awarded a grant.

Two other North Texas towns have fall festivals on the calendar close to Depot Day. The city of Pilot Point says its Main Street Program will hold the 15th annual Bonnie and Clyde Days on the town's historic square on Oct. 10, from 2 to 9 p.m. Denison's city calendar sets that city's 39th annual downtown Fall Festival for Oct. 3, one week before Depot Day.