Strawberry Festival draws large crowd to downtown Public Square

Friday, June 5, 2026 at 1:50 PM

Sold out!

The Shelby Senior Services Strawberry Festival was allotted for three hours Friday. Ninety minutes into serving, supplies were dwindling quickly.

“We bought 850 pounds (of strawberries) this year, 50 more than last year,” said Shelby Senior Services Executive Director Liz Renton at noon. “I think we are going to run out before 1 p.m. Our goal is to last the whole time but we are not going to complain about a sellout.”

The City of Shelbyville’s Government Day free lunch was over by 12:15 p.m. The city provided 400 hot dogs, chips and a drink to those downtown and that went quickly on a picture perfect day on the Public Square.

Both events were slated to run from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. but hundreds turned out to enjoy the free lunch, support Shelby Senior Services, and enjoy the weather.

“It’s definitely one of our biggest events of the year,” said Renton. “We like to call it a ‘friendraiser.’ There is a lot that goes into it. So it doesn’t necessarily raise the most amount of money but we really love doing it for our community.”

City of Shelbyville representatives helped grill and serve hot dogs along E. Washington Street.

Shelby Senior Services relied on its staff and more than 70 volunteers to make its event successful.

“We had 71 volunteers cutting strawberries (Thursday) for about three hours. On top of that, our staff worked all beforehand just to do that,” said Renton, who has now been part of the event for nearly a decade.

All the work was rewarded with a huge turnout Friday.

“It’s amazing,” said Renton. “Our staff and volunteers have worked extremely hard to make it happen. To see it all come into fruition is just … it makes us feel happy.”