ROCHESTER — Just one day after the summer Solstice, Friends’ Marketplace welcomed in the summer with its first ever summer kickoff celebration.

Vendors selling ice cream, pizza, steak tips, linguica, burke beverages and more lined the parking lot outside Friends’ Marketplace during the Saturday, June 21 event.

Rebecca Harris, who coordinated the event, said the marketplace chose to hold the kickoff celebration after it had success with its fall kickoff event.

She explained that they also wanted to coincide the events with the start and end of school and that the event was meant to “bring the community together.”

Harris said organizing the event didn’t come with many challenges since every vendor already sells their products in the marketplace.

“We have everyone’s name and number, and we just went from my list and to see who can make it and who can’t,” she explained.

More than a dozen vendors attended the event, including Wild Mike’s Pizza, Gifford’s ice cream, Ma’s Donuts and Gaspar’s Sausage Company.

Chuck Gaspar, from Gaspar Sausage Company, and his grandson served up linguica sandwiches to event attendees.

Gaspar explained that the family company has been around for 102 years and he decided to participate in the event after Friends’ Marketplace, which is one of his company’s customers, contacted him.

This was the first time Gaspar took part in one of the marketplace’s events and said he thought it was a “pretty busy” event but “calmed down quite a bit” nearly two hours in.

Harris said the event was originally scheduled for last weekend but it got rained out.

She said that while the kickoff was “very busy” when it started at 12 p.m. she thinks there would have been a larger turnout if the event hadn’t been postponed.

The event was free for attendees, with each vendor giving away samples for free.

“We just want to thank our customers for shopping here all year and figured to get them a treat,” Harris said.