By COLE REIF
Great Bend Post
People like wine. People like animals. Combining wine with wild animals has not been as likeable. That’s what the City of Great Bend and the Brit Spaugh Zoo are finding out.
The Wine in the Wild fundraiser was held last Friday night at the zoo for an evening with live music, food, wine and access to animal encounters and exhibits. Great Bend Community Coordinator Christina Hayes said selling tickets at $40 each did not see successful numbers.
"Even though this expensive event was kind of a flop, we won't do it next year, we still made three times the amount of money that the Zoological Society made at their last fundraiser," said Hayes. "We still made a good amount of money in small thousands, not multiple thousands which we were hoping to do."
Friday’s event was the first fundraiser for the zoo organized by the city. Hayes said Wine in the Wild will not return next year, but staff is working on finding a new event to raise funds for the free zoo.
All the proceeds from the fundraiser went directly to supporting the zoo.