Festa Italiana brings $70 million in automobiles to the Auto Gallery and Events Center

GREEN BAY, Wis. (WFRV) – $70 million of Italian automobiles will converge on Green Bay on Saturday at the Auto Gallery and Event Center’s second Festa Italiana. More than 100 cars will be a part of the festival, which is double the size of the event last year.

“This is true Italian flavor at its best,” The Auto Gallery and Event Center executive director Darrel Burnett said. “We have gone out of our way to bring the very finest Italian vehicles spanning nine decades to the Automobile Gallery on a single day.”

Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Maseratis, Alfa Romeos, Fiats, and more will be on display, with some cars less than a week old and others 88 years old.

“Our slogan is the automobile is the art. And nothing embodies that more than Italian design,” Burnett said. “This collection will never be together again in the same way in history. So it’s a real chance to experience true art versus a car show.”

Burnett says that this is an ambitious event, but his nonprofit organization is determined not only to have a beneficial fundraiser but also to put itself on the map as a high-end automobile force across the country and even the world.

“We don’t see ourselves as a Green Bay organization, we don’t see ourselves as northeast Wisconsin, we see ourselves as a window to the world,” Burnett said. “Bringing $70 million of Italian vehicles in for the day isn’t something that’s available to anyone across the entire Midwest.”

The sight that will greet eventgoers on Saturday at 2 p.m. at the gallery does not come without a lot of effort and persistence from Burnett and his team, as they have to convince car owners to send their prized possessions to the event for free.

“Not as simple as picking up the phone and calling them,” Burnett said. “Sometimes we have to earn that trust because the harder we work to earn that trust the more valuable the result is at the end.”