The Boston Vegetarian Society began in 1986. The first activities were centered around holding vegan potlucks in a church basement during the late 1980s. The Society has seen a steady rise in membership and attendance ever since. In 1998, it was incorporated in Massachusetts as an educational non-profit. In July 1998, it was granted 501 tax-exempt status by the IRS. The BVS provides info on events and related organizations, hosts the annual Boston Vegetarian Food Festival, holds cooking classes, and promotes vegetarianism through mass transit advertising, outreach at fairs and festivals, and monthly free educational seminars. Their New Year's banquet and vegan cooking classes were reported to be particularly popular. BVS "seeks to make a better world for people, animals, and the earth through advancing a healthful vegetarian diet and a compassionate ethic." BVS provides education, encouragement, and community support for vegetarians. The BVS also participates in the annual Earth Day Festival of Boston University.
Boston Vegetarian Food Festival (BVFF)
Since 1996, the Boston Vegetarian Society has annually hosted the Boston Vegetarian Food Festival in October or November. It was first held on May 5, 1996, at the Howard W. Johnson Athletics Center at MIT because MIT graduate students affiliated with the MIT Vegetarian Support Group provided a substantial proportion of the initial organizing effort. In addition, in October of that year, they held a World Vegetarian Day celebration outdoors on the Boston Common. This is believed by North American vegetarians to be the first modern vegetarian food festival held in the United States, although the Toronto Vegetarian Food Fair had been held annually since 1985. The American Vegan Society reported in January 2018 that now "Over 120 VegFests in the United States are planned for 2018", and most are purely vegan food festivals. The second BVFF, in October 1997, was held at Bunker Hill Community College. This combined as one combined event their indoor vegetarian food festival and the sense of the World Vegetarian Day event, since the combined event would be perpetually held around October or November. Since 1998, it has been held at the Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center in the Roxbury Crossing section of Boston, across the street from Roxbury Community College. Over the course of years, attendance grew so much that the festival was expanded from one day to two days in 2009. In October 2016, between 15,000 and 20,000 were estimated to attend the festival. The 2017 BVFF was held October 21and 22, the 2018 BVFF was held October 20and 21, and the 2019 BVFF was held October 19 and 20. Each year's roster of speakers is almost entirely new; Dr. Michael Greger has been the only speaker who returns nearly each year, typically on or around his birthday. Several different branding logos have been used since 1996 for subway, bus, newspaper, and other advertising; the current committee is seeking a single brand for the increasingly popular event. The winning logos used on each year's festival's merchandise have emerged variably from college students and professional graphic artists.
