Meet Jesus Calderon, Yum marketing director
interview+photos Jorge Perezchica
It’s Thursday, April 28th approximately 5pm. I’m arriving to The Shops at Palm Desert (formerly known as Westfield Palm Desert) to meet up with Yum Food Fest co-founder and marketing director, Jesus Calderon for an interview. Jesus shows up fittingly in a bright yellow shirt covered with food motifs. His face beams with a friendly countenance and dark glasses frame his squinty eyes whenever he smiles (often). We walk over to the upper deck parking lot structure, the venue where the Yum Food Fest will take place from May 7-8th. I stand onto the parking structure overlooking the city of Palm Desert, an official sponsor — Jesus is quick to note proudly.
I glance around looking for a backdrop to take a portrait of Jesus and document this moment. The first thing I notice are the colored walls painted with eclectic art and graffiti from previous events or projects by Flat Black Art Supply, an urban art shop and gallery residing at the mall. The markings are indicative of the local art scene but also a testament of the mall’s support towards fostering a vibrant cultural community — and openness to new ideas such as Yum Food Fest.
Jesus stands enthusiastically and poses in front of a graffiti wall. We take a few photos. Then sit down to talk more about his personal background as a promoter and the story behind Yum Food Fest. Calderon tells me it’s time to dial up the marketing to hyper drive mode — with just a few days left before Yum Food Fest launches it’s second edition. Billed as the desert’s ‘MUST ATTEND’ event for all foodies. Yum Food Fest will feature over 40 food trucks, food pop-ups, sweets, treats, drinks, and culture vendors. Live music from favorite local DJs, bands, and entertainers. Also available will be a full bar for those 21+.
Yum Food Fest is the brainchild between co-founders: Justin Finn, Esther Power and Jesus Calderon. First conceived and organized rather swiftly over just a few months, and launched in October 2021. Yum Food Fest became an overnight success with strong word of mouth, social media marketing and COVID-19 pandemic receding — all the right ingredients seemed to align together perfectly at the right place and time. Yum Food Fest’s formula worked well enough to attract thousands of festival goers that lined up eager to munch and sip to the savory taste of Yum flavors. The event exceeded expectations and became an instant hit.
Fresh off their early success, what comes next? Yum Food Fest will test it’s formula once again with a supersized two day weekend from May 7 through May 8th falling on Mother’s Day. As the opening lingers just around the corner, you can almost smell the sweet scent of aromas brewing on social media, while each day teases more information about food vendors or entertainment — like a slow drip that whets the appetite as you try to tame your cravings. If you’re eager enough for a sneak peek, VIF (Very Important Foodie) offers a one hour early entry, 15% discounts, a free drink and other perks.
In the meantime, read along for the Coachella Magazine interview with Jesus Calderon, Yum Food Fest marketing director. The text has been edited for clarity.
Coachella Magazine: Hello, introduce yourself to the world.
Jess Calderon: My name is Jesus Calderon, born and raised Coachella Valley resident. I have a background in marketing and promotion. I started promoting for nightclubs and bars, and the casinos out here from 2015 to 2019. And now we’re doing this Yum Food Fest.
CM: How did you first get into marketing?
JC: I’ve always been myself. I’ve never had like an ego about it or felt I was better than anybody because I was a promoter. I was always just myself. I love talking to people. I love just getting people excited about something. My main thing back then was the nightlife promo, throwing birthday parties for people. I would try to book birthday parties every week. It was a weekly thing for years. So, being able to help people celebrate their birthdays was my main objective pretty much. And I built a lot of friendships and relationships around that, and celebrating other people and making them feel good.
Everybody lives their lives. Everybody has their problems and their stress. I felt like, what I was able to provide was a kind of an escape from that. And just to enjoy, even if it’s just for a night to enjoy yourself with your friends, and your family. There were people that were bringing their parents out sometimes. It was a lot of fun. So I just learned from that too. I’m just myself and I’ve always been humble and just a people person in general and just not feeding into negativity.
There was a lot of competition back then too. There’s people trying to call you out on social media, it was competition. It was fun, but I never fed into that. I always just responded with numbers, like success, you know what I mean?
And now with Yum, what really keeps me going, what really excites me every time I go out, aside from the social media promo, I personally do a lot of legwork. I go around the mall businesses, all around the valley. Everybody eats, everybody needs to eat — right? So our event is a family event and everybody’s invited. It’s amazing to see people get excited about this and ask me why are you doing food trucks and this and that? People get excited about it and that really just motivates me even more, every single time I get a cool reaction.
CM: Let’s talk about Yum Food Fest. How did it all start, who’s in your team and how did it come together?
JC: In July 2021, a good, my good friend Justin Finn approached me and told me he had this idea of doing a food festival. He also comes from a promotions background for 21 and up events. He used to work closely with BB Ingle that passed away recently. (BB Ingle was a revered local Coachella Valley resident and events promotor known for his popular Halloween and New Year’s Eve parties). Justin came to me and he asked, “What do you think about doing a food festival at the mall?” It sounded like a great opportunity. And he asked me if I wanted to be his partner in the whole thing. I said, “I would love to.” I was tired of doing events with hundreds of people, I wanted to do events with thousands of people.
So we announced it in late July 2021. It was October 16th when we did it last year on a Saturday. And we brought in Esther Power from EP Black Label. We brought her in to help us with booking vendors and other backend things. So it’s the three of us that puts this whole thing together.
CM: What’s the dynamic like between the three of you working together?
JC: Justin and I, we had a vision from the beginning. We sat with her and told her all about it and she was all in right from the beginning and we worked great together. We all have different personalities, but we love to do events and we love to bring the community together. What we’re doing is for the locals.
CM: Was the mall your first choice to have the festival or were you thinking about other options?
JC: No, this was definitely the first choice because I used to work at the mall for four years as a manager. So this is almost like the heart of the valley because it’s central and it’s the only major mall. Everybody comes here to go shopping for whatever holiday or special occasion. This is the place to come. If you want something to do during the summer, you come to the mall, get some food, hang out. So yeah, this was our first choice.
CM: What were some of the challenges and rewards launching the event?
JC: I would say, the challenges for sure was trying to book vendors. With any food festival or event there’s usually vendor fees. For us, being a brand new event, we had to convince vendors who had no idea who we were, to jump on board with us and there’s the financials of it. We told them our vision and our estimated numbers that we wanted, were planning to get at least 4,000 people on one day. We wanted to get different types of foods, so there’s no competition. And we ended up getting about 20 food vendors.
CM: And the second one, how many vendors?
JC: We’re gonna have about 30 vendors. I’d say the main challenge was, it took us a while to book all the vendors.
CM: Was it a lot easier for the second one?
JC: Oh, a heck of a lot easier. Because we had solid numbers now, we could tell the vendors we had about 7,500 for the first one. Now we’re gonna expand it to two days instead of one day. And we’re planning to get at least 6,000 people per day.
CM: Are all the vendors local?
JC: Most are from out of town but we do incorporate several local vendors as well.
CM: What was the main thing you were looking for in a vendor?
JC: We just wanted to get food that was kind of like entertainment in a way, where their presentation is a little different and it’s more fun looking. Obviously we want good quality food, but also where it’s a little bit different, the way they present their food.
CM: Did you get a chance to try everything during the event?
JC: I didn’t. We were so busy, it was like overwhelming. Like I said, we were hoping to get like 4,000 people, had about 2,000 pre-sale tickets out there. And then, the day of the event, we had like over 5,000 people on top of that show up.
So we were understaffed and it was a little hectic, but we managed and you know, we didn’t have any issues. Most people had fun. There were long lines unfortunately. We were supposed to have about 25 food vendors, the first one, but five of them canceled on us. So, it made really long waits for food and I felt bad about it. But honestly, at the end of it, I felt bad more than anything because, we want people to have a good time and enjoy some great food and a lot of the vendors sold out.
Now we’re coming back prepared. It’s two days now May 7th, May 8th, both days. What we plan to do is bring different vendors each time. We do have some of the fan favorites coming back, but a majority are new vendors coming this time.
CM: What would you say is the lesson you learned most from the first event to prepare you for the second edition?
JC: Definitely, just to have more of everything, (laughs) more staff, more cleaning staff, more people working in restroom area. We’re changing the layout. It’s gonna be more food, more seating too.
CM: How did the festival name “Yum Food Fest” come about?
JC: So Justin, the head of this whole thing, I call him the yum father (laughs). It was his idea, he was thinking, “what do people think or say, when you think of delicious food? Just “yum.” So we just liked it and we ran with it.
CM: That must have made it a little bit easier for you to market and promote.
JC: Exactly. And that’s why I love the name too. Eventually. I want to just be known as “yum” just like you have all these other festivals where it’s just one name.
CM: What were some of the most popular food items in the first one?
JC: I would definitely say it was fries. There’s a food truck that we brought from out of town, Fries Galore. They do gourmet french fries and had a crazy line the whole time. Everybody loves different types of fries. So we’re actually bringing them back. Honestly, all of ’em were busy, we saw everybody eating different types of foods.
CM: What vendors are you are excited about for the second edition?
JC: I’m honestly excited for all of them. We have so many delicious food, desserts and drink vendors coming to Yum. Visit our Instagram page @yum_foodfest for all the latest updates, amazing photos, videos and vendor map. Plan your Yum experience accordingly. I do want to mention Cousins Maine Lobster. It’s a food truck. They’re celebrating their 10 year anniversary on Shark Tank show. They started out with one food truck. They get all their lobster from Maine and it’s delicious. Now they’re a nationally known food truck franchise.
CM: Tell us more about other vendors and entertainment.
JC: The Bamn Camp Store. They’re a local store here in Palm Desert. They sell exclusive streetwear and shoes. It’s a lot of dope stuff. It’s definitely what’s in. They’re gonna have their own area, it’s called “The Cookout.” They’re gonna have a few vendors in there. We’re also gonna have CV Meetups, shout out to Daisy, she’s gonna have her own area as well with some fun activities, face painting for the kids, they’re gonna be doodling with Gutterdoodles. We’re gonna have a big stage with performances. So, you know, there’s gonna be entertainment throughout the entire event.
CM: Who are some of the entertainment acts?
JC: We have the Brosquitos, The Sol Suns, Dalilah Rose from Desert Hot Springs, Abigail Carter, I saw her at the Palm Spring street fair performing, and I thought she was great. So I wanted to bring her. Also we have our first official Yum DJ. His name is Markuzarea. He is very versatile. He’s gonna be on stage playing all kinds of music. We’re also gonna do a a tribute to the great Vicente Fernández performed by the Mariachi Estrella de Coachella. They’ve been out here since 1977 doing their thing. So they are well known mariachi band.
CM: What was the response and feedback that you got so far from the community?
JC: I would say 99% of people understood that with it being the first one, we didn’t know what to expect. So, because it was so many people and there were long lines and everything, most people understood, and they’re like, “oh, you know, we had fun, we still had fun.” Everybody had fun and we can’t wait for the next one.
It was a great response. We put out a statement immediately after thanking everybody on Instagram. We thanked everybody and then we talked about the stuff that we saw that we could improve for the next one. So, we’re definitely ready.
CM: How would you describe the festival in one or two sentences?
JC: Yum Food Fest is all about food, culture, and lifestyle. Those are our three main points of focus. Obviously food first, but we also focus on showcasing lifestyle and culture in different ways. So, Yum Food Fest is all about food, lifestyle and culture, and it’s a food festival that is here to bring the Coachella Valley together.
CM: Do you want to mention anything else about the sponsors?
JC: I definitely want to give a special thank you and shout out to all of our official sponsors for the second Yum Food Fest coming up. First, I’m proud to say that we got sponsorship from the city of Palm Desert. That’s big, that’s huge for us, cause that just makes us feel, look like a legitimate event. Not that we weren’t, but just to have the stamp of approval from the city is great. Also Renova Energy. It’s one of the top solar companies in the valley. We got sponsorship from them. Palm Desert Bike n Brews. That’s a great shop right here in Palm Desert. They sell all kinds of mountain bikes e-bikes you can rent ’em or buy ’em. It’s a great store. And they also have a beer and coffee bar. Nicole Beck from Century 21, she’s a realtor. She does a lot of great stuff out here. Frontier the cable company. Grocery Outlet in Cathedral City. They’re gonna be contributing to the event. And Bamn Camp store here in Palm Desert. And an exclusive showroom experience by TESLA motors.
THE DETAILS:
WHAT: YUM FOOD FEST
WHEN: May 7-8th from 5pm-11pm (4pm VIF)
WHERE: The Shops at Palm Desert 72840 HIGHWAY 111,PALM DESERT, CA 92260
TICKETS: Price $5 general admission. $40 VIF (Very Important Foodie)
