Craftathon returns to Downtown Fort Walton Beach for 10th year, benefits arts foundation

Craftathon returned to Landing Park on Sunday with a formula that has kept it alive for a decade: beer, downtown foot traffic and a fundraiser that sends every dollar to one local cause. The 10th installment ran from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. for VIP ticket holders and from noon to 4 p.m. for general admission at 127 Brooks St SE in Fort Walton Beach.

That staying power matters in a crowded festival calendar. A 2026 event listing said last year’s Craftathon drew more than 1,000 beer enthusiasts, with pours from participating breweries and snacks from local eateries. Earlier editions showed the same pattern of steady growth and reliable fundraising, with organizers saying the 2024 event raised $11,764 for the Eleanor J. Johnson Youth Center and a 2023 write-up putting the previous year’s crowd above 900 and its haul at $10,000 for Fresh Start Florida.

The beneficiary this year, the Mattie Kelly Arts Foundation, gave the festival a broader civic role than a standard tasting event. MKAF was established in 1995 and operates the Mattie Kelly Cultural Arts Village in Destin. Local profiles say the foundation has enlightened, empowered and educated more than 400,000 children across more than 100 schools and partner agencies along Northwest Florida’s Gulf Coast.

That mission fit Craftathon’s identity. The event has always read as a curated craft beer festival rather than a catch-all beer tent, and the downtown park setting made that feel even more deliberate. Landing Park put the crowd in the middle of Fort Walton Beach, where the day belonged as much to the city’s public spaces as it did to the pint glasses.

For local breweries, homebrewers and beer fans, the appeal was not just variety but continuity. Craftathon has survived by keeping its purpose clear and its footprint local: drink good beer, keep the money here and support an arts organization with deep roots in the region. After 10 years, that simple model still looked like one of the most durable parts of the Fort Walton Beach beer scene.