Whether you’re a lifelong vegan or just want to break from an omnivorous diet for the first time, Brookfield’s newest street event is for you.
The inaugural Vegan on Broadway event, featuring live music and vendors selling vegan hot food, vegan baked goods, vegan snacks to take home, jewelry, merchandise and more, was held from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 3, at the Brookfield Shops and along Broadway Avenue. A second installment is scheduled for this Saturday, Nov. 7, at the same time.
Valerie Vedral, the owner and operator of the Vulgar Vegan, one of the six small businesses inhabiting the Brookfield Shops retail incubator program, said her idea for the vegan street festival came about due to the void left by a similar event.
“I met with the village, I think it was back in May, to do a vegan street fest. The idea for it was prompted by the fact that Vegandale, which happened for many years in Chicago, wasn’t coming back in its original form to the city this year,” Vedral told the Landmark. “There was this need, I guess, for a replacement event.”
While Vedral said she and the rest of the organization team didn’t get an exact headcount, she said the event was well-attended, to the point that the three hot food vendors all sold out around 3 p.m., and the three baked food vendors all nearly or fully sold out, too.
“I did not have very high expectations going into the event, being that it was new. We were so crunched for time trying to promote and organize it that I wasn’t sure what the crowds were going to be like, but we were very pleasantly surprised,” Vedral said. “We had tons of people that came out. We had people from Brookfield, obviously, but we got a lot of people from the city and the suburbs. We even had some people take the train in and walk over to the fest.”
Libby Popovic, Brookfield’s director of community development, said the event came about as part of the Vulgar Vegan’s residency at the Brookfield Shops.
“We encourage all of the vendors to have different events and really showcase their products,” Popovic said. “Valerie had a great idea to do a little test pilot and have vegan food and vegan vendors come on Broadway. This is a really good example of how Brookfield can leverage some of these partnerships and collaborative programming.”
Despite its success, Vedral said she had envisioned a larger event for the initial Vegan on Broadway, including a stage for live music performers and collaborations with more businesses in Brookfield, like Galloping Ghost.
“I also wanted an educational aspect. We wanted to have people who could be there from organizations that could — let’s say you’re not vegan, or maybe you are vegan, but you’re not really sure how to cook on your own. Someone could give a little talk about nutrition, some of the benefits of eating vegan. Another organization could talk about cruelty to animals and things like that,” Vedral said.
Some of those educational opportunities are now planned for the second Vegan on Broadway, Vedral said.
While the November’s iteration will likely be similar in scope to October’s, having come about as a similarly spur-of-the-moment event, she said she hopes to revamp it next year to achieve that grander vision.
“A lot of my customers were asking afterwards, ‘Are you going to do it again?’ A lot of the vendors were telling us that they had a great time. It exceeded their expectations, and they would love to come back out again,” Vedral said.
While the village has approved a liquor license for the sale of mixed drinks for the second Vegan on Broadway, Vedral said there won’t be any other “big switch-ups,” but the event will feature some new vendors in-person and virtually.
She described a partnership with New Book Joy, which opened at the Brookfield Shops in 2025 and moved into a brick-and-mortar location on Prairie Avenue this spring, to offer a curated list of books on and related to veganism. People can preorder the books through New Book Joy and pick them up at Vegan on Broadway or place orders through a QR code at the event.
“Mandy [Genge, the owner of New Book Joy] put together a curated list of different cookbooks, other plant-based books, books about animals, bestsellers, books from badass female authors,” Vedral said. “The cookbooks — oh my gosh, they are so good. I have several of them at home. There were several other books in there that I was like, ‘People are going to love this.’”
Vedral said Vegan on Broadway is open to anyone.
“It was a really great time last month, and we’re hoping that, on the 7th, it will be another wonderful event,” she said. “One of my customers who is not vegan, she samples food from every one of the hot food vendors and then went and bought enough for her to have dinner. This is the kind of thing we’re bringing. Come with your appetite, come meet some great people, and learn a little bit about the vegan lifestyle.”
