For two days each year, Waynesville becomes the largest city in Warren County when more than 350,000 people visit the Ohio Sauerkraut Festival.

Ron Kronenberger, co-chairman of the Ohio Sauerkraut Festival, said the annual event that fills Main Street with people and booths selling unusual crafts also draws people to sample sauerkraut in pork dinners, on bratwurst, in cakes, bread, cookies, pies, brownies, bite-size balls, pizza, German sundaes and cabbage rolls.

Many of the craft and food booth are major fundraisers for local school, church, athletic and community organizations, said Kronenberger, who estimated the economic impact of the festival in the millions of dollars for Warren County and the surrounding region.

“This is the 29th best craft show in America, according to Sunshine Artists,” Kronenberger said. “It helps vendors decide decide where to go sell.”

He said there were 469 booths from 25 states, including Hawaii, selling food and crafts up and down Main Street and very few were selling the same things. He said a jury decides what vendors will sell crafts and a jury goes out to the booths on Saturday to make sure they’re doing what they said they’d do.

While Main Street was crowded with people, one vendor said she wasn’t as busy as she’s seen it on Saturday afternoons at past festivals.

“There are a lot of people walking without bags,” said Donna Volk of Galena, who sells seasonal floral decorations. “It’s been slow today and I hope it picks up.”

Volk, who owns Donna’s Dolls and Decoratives, has been coming to the festival for 18 years. She usually makes $2,000 to $3,000 during the weekend.

“I love the show,” she said. “Everyone is really nice, the chamber (of commerce) has been helpful…. It’s addicting because it’s always a good show.”

Local merchant Tammy Curnutt of Sawdust and Stitches said her business was going to be “wonderful” over the weekend.

Curnutt said her merchandise is handmade by her and local artists for her shop at 98 S. Main St., where she’s been for the past year after expanding from another shop in town. While the visiting vendors are in front of her shop, Curnutt said the crowd eventually “seeps behind the tents along Main Street and checks out the local merchants.”

While many come for the crafts, others come for the food.

Pat Dowe of St. Augustine Catholic Church said their food booth generates about $35,000, making it one of the parish’s biggest fundraisers.

“It started last Sunday with preparations and from Monday through Thursday, from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., we’ve been making 12,000 cabbage rolls,” he said. “We’re all glad that it’s only one time a year.”

Dowe said the crowd looked a little smaller for midday Saturday than it has been in the past. However, he said business was steady.