ChamberFest fills Central Avenue with sand pile, music and booths

A giant sand pile drew families to Central Avenue, but ChamberFest was really a civic marketplace: county staff, nonprofits, health providers and local businesses set up side by side while the Hillstompers played and children moved between booths and bouncy houses. Los Alamos Transit Mix and Los Alamos County Public Works coordinated delivery of the sand pile, underscoring how much county and private-sector coordination the event required.

The booth mix showed how much ground ChamberFest covered. The Department of Public Utilities, Esperanza Shelter, Leadership Los Alamos, the Los Alamos Concert Association, EXIT Realty Advantage NM and Christus St. Vincent were among the groups on hand, alongside sponsors UNIFI, Wingate by Wyndham, North Central Regional Transit District, N3B and Exit Realty Advantage NM. Esperanza Shelter’s presence pointed residents to a concrete service, with staff coming to Los Alamos the first and third Wednesday of each month and based inside county Social Services at 1183 Diamond Drive.

The Chamber listed ChamberFest Los Alamos and ChamberFest White Rock for Saturday, June 6, 2026, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., describing it as an annual street fair where member organizations interact with the public. The Los Alamos Chamber of Commerce is a program of the Los Alamos Commerce and Development Corporation, a private not-for-profit 501(c)(6) active in Los Alamos since 1983. The Chamber says it began in Los Alamos in 1963 with a mission to strengthen the Los Alamos and White Rock business community.

This year’s preview added a Corvette Show and promised new outreach aimed at connecting with more residents. That extra attraction fit the broader ChamberFest pattern, which has long mixed family activities with a direct pitch for local attention, whether the visitor came for a business contact, a public service or a child’s turn in the sand.

ChamberFest traces back to Summerfest in 1996, when chamber leaders moved away from an indoor trade fair at Cumbres Junior High that was not drawing enough attendance or downtown excitement. The goal then was simple: bring people downtown and support local merchants. Decades later, ChamberFest still worked the same way, turning Central Avenue and White Rock into a place where business promotion, civic participation and everyday community life met in the open street.