Sonoma County women are furious after an unknown scammer circulated AI-generated ads for a “Wine Country Women’s Festival” that seemed to dupe even local officials.
The festival was supposed to take place this Saturday at Keiser Park in the town of Windsor, and ads began circulating in the summer on social media, promoting opportunities for local businesses, nonprofits, schools and community groups to participate.
According to suspicious-looking ads on its still-active Instagram page, the festival pledged to “support women” and “build community” with hands-on sessions, live performances and “meaningful conversations.”
A now-defunct website offered vendors a 10-by-10 foot space for $79, $132 tickets for “food truck partners” and $185 “Home & Garden Showcase Partner” tickets.
The organizer even submitted a rental application in July, which the town processed. There was also a deposit and certificate of insurance for an expected large gathering with upwards of 1,500 attendees.
But in September, two local women began raising alarms about the event.
“We tried to contact the event planner and didn’t receive any return to our phone calls or emails,” Olivia Lemen, Windsor’s parks and recreation director, told the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.
Late last month, officials began warning people about the event’s legitimacy. The application was canceled after unpaid fees.
“This is the first time that we’ve really had an event planner pay for a deposit and the certificate of insurance and then not follow through with paying the fees and having an application canceled,” Lemen said.
One vendor reported the event to the Better Business Bureau after paying the booth fee, SFGate reported, and Windsor police told the Press Democrat that it received one report of fraud connected to the purported scam.
One Sonoma mother said on social media that members of her mom’s group also fell for the scam and paid up.
Another woman said she paid for the vendor fee. It’s unclear how many victims were there and who was behind it. The Post reached out to local police for details.
Mary Orellana, owner of Lovey Coffee Company in Santa Rosa, and Hilary Richards, a Windsor mom who founded a women’s community group, have publicly complained that the town did not act immediately on their concerns.
They stayed up until 3 a.m. every night to investigate the event, Orellana claimed, and when they went to the town to bring the issue up, they “weren’t taken seriously.”
Windsor only canceled the application after the women went on social media to air their suspicions, Orellana said, and the town “acted like they knew nothing.”
“Let’s talk about authorities not listening to women, our local government not doing anything to protect its constituents,” Orellana wrote in a joint post with Richards.
The Post reached out to the women and to the town for comment.
Many in the women’s social circles commented that they interacted online with the organizer, which only fueled more suspicions. When Richards reached out to the page for more details about the event, an organizer that only went by the name of “Jennifer” claimed it was doing outreach to prop it up, according to a screenshot.
“I was contacted about a booth and it all seemed super off to me from the beginning. Not buying it,” commented local Realtor Kristen Preuss.
“Asked them to email us directly, twice and never received a response other than another dm! Either a scam or just incredibly disorganized/unprofessional,” commented a local dance studio.
“Every time people asked for more than surface level repeat info, they flat out stop responding. Not a good look,” Richards added.
The responses from the organizer seemed AI-generated, multiple people noted.
The Post also reached out to the organizer through Instagram asking for comment.
