Following the growth over the years of a Milledgeville-centric festival, a lawsuit, a subsequent re-branding campaign and painstaking attention to detail, Milledgeville’s Deep Roots Festival was honored with awards in multiple categories at the Southeast Festivals and Events (SFEA) Conference earlier in the week.

“It just speaks volumes of the volunteers that worked on the committee,” chairman Frank Pendergast said Friday.

The bulk of the awards were for the successful marketing of the festival, a feat undertaken by Co-chairs Heather Kennedy and Jimmy Holder.

“We have a product that we are so proud of,” Holder said. “They’re marketing awards, but winning is due to the work of the group.”

The Deep Roots Committee meets monthly leading up to the October festival with the frequency of meetings increasing upon the approach of the event. Responsibilities are given to individuals who handle specific areas in advance of the festival, making sure that the event that draws thousands of people — and thousands of dollars — into Milledgeville takes place with no major deficiencies.

The Deep Roots Festival took gold for first place in six categories, silver for second place in three categories and bronze for third in one category. The festival is largely a volunteer effort, administered through Milledgeville Mainstreet. Just three committee members were paid as they worked on Deep Roots, but still contributed numerous volunteer hours.

“We were competing against the likes of Macon’s Cherry Blossom Festival and Atlanta’s Yellow Daisy Festival,” Milledgeville Mainstreet director Belinda Washlesky said.

The fact that a volunteer effort made the wins is that much sweeter Holder said.

“We’ve attended SFEA every year, and you’re always in the room with the greats,” Holder said. “There are festivals from all over the southeast. Many of them are paid, and we’re almost all volunteer. That is the icing on the cake, too. We were beating out design firms from Macon and Atlanta.”

Still another aspect may have made enough of a difference to put Deep Roots over the top.

Following success as the Sweetwater Festival, a lawsuit filed by the Sweetwater Brewing Co. resulted in a name change. The familiarity festival-goers had with the festival was gone, at least in name. The aggressive marketing and re-branding effort that followed may have had a beneficial, but unforeseen, effect.

“Our whole committee, with the name change, we were concerned that it might not be as good as it had been and it drove us to try even harder,” Washlesky said. “I think they [SFEA] saw that we overcame the name change and staffing shortages.”

In the months leading up to the festival, Mainstreet was without a director or support staff. The committee moved swiftly to ensure that the event would not be complicated by the branding effort or Mainstreet staffing issues. Recognition from SFEA would indicate that the work of the group was successful.

“We felt the most pressure with the Deep Roots design due to the lawsuit,” Holder said. “The hard thing about marketing this is that it is marketed to people ages 5 to 95. When we applied for consideration, honestly we were just hoping to win best t-shirt.”

The delegation attending the conference was pleasantly surprised by the number of awards and categories they won in. Arguably the biggest win of the program was for best event. Deep Roots won the gold designation for first place.

“I think the reason it is such great cause for celebration is that we are finally over the hump of the lawsuit,” Holder said. “It was a test of everyone’s endurance.”

The Deep Roots Festival won first place gold in the categories of best event, best Web site, best marketing campaign, best single print ad, best banner and, of course, best t-shirt. The festival took the second place silver finish for best event program/brochure, best poster and best pin. The festival took third place bronze for best miscellaneous printed material.

“To win this many awards with the competition that we had is pretty impressive,” committee chairman Pendergast said. “It certainly shows that we put on a quality event.”

One nice surprise for the delegation was recognition for Milledgeville Mainstreet, who won a surprising second place for best new event for the Milledgeville Marketplace Farmer’s Market.

One other aspect that Holder said helped the festival to gain the attention it deserves is the application process.

“We had to submit an application and presentation of the event,” Holder said. “It’s all about the presentation and the organizers said that Deep Roots just stood out in the presentation of the applications.”

With planning for the 2010 event under way since the conclusion of the 2009 festival, the committee hopes to continue to drive Deep Roots to its highest potential.

“I am very proud of our committee and the hard work they do,” Pendergast said. “It’s nice to get some accolades.”