24th annual Niles Festival of Lights parade

Hello Niles and beyond!

I am truly thankful for the outpouring of community support, well wishes and good tidings. Because of you, our 24th annual Niles Festival of Lights parade was a success. With ten floats, six bands, 65 Tap Dancing Christmas Trees, and over 1500 parade participants, this was the longest and highest attended parade ever. Please send us your parade photos to include in social media and website! Info@niles.org

Each year, we try to make improvements and adjustments to ensure the community and local businesses can enjoy themselves. The early street closure is something the city has imposed over the past five years for safety reasons. To help offset the impact, we are slowly growing pre-parade activities to encourage people to come in to town early, enjoy the shops and festivities. The Santa photo ops were a hit and will be back next year! We were also able to open up additional parking before the parade which was an incredible help as well. Next year, we will add more family friendly activities.

The mobile vending - we do the best we can to keep the parade footprint clear. Overall commentary from years past were complaints about mobile vendors blocking parade views. This parade attracts thousands in our small footprint. We just don't have the space to allow mobile vendors. Not to mention we have permits we are obligated to adhere to. We will continue to keep up our efforts to prevent mobile vendors from accessing the parade footprint.

The chairs.... oh the chairs.... This year, I was pleased to see the rush of chairs did not happen, mostly, until Friday morning. While NMSA reserves the right to clear chairs at will, we simply do not have the funds or the capacity to hire extra security and incorporate resources for chair management. We are considering doing a chair rental program where Niles Main Street invests in a section of chairs people can rent, only open to the community and businesses? Maybe you become a Niles Main Street member and a benefit is a chair rental for the parade? We will continue to work on this and strive to do better.

Special thanks to all of our volunteers, especially Lindsay and Josh, local high school Key Clubs, Upbeat Parade Productions, Fremont PD, Mr. Mikey's Country Store and family, American Legion Post 837 at Niles Veterans Hall, and all the workers who help us make this happen. Thank you to Fremont PD dispatch and Community Services who fielded numerous calls and questions from me.

Special thanks to our major sponsors - City of Fremont, Supervisor Haubert, Washington Health, Rae Rae's at Joe's Corner, and Republic Services. This parade and our annual events cannot happen without sponsors like these.

This Tuesday, Dec 2, is our holiday membership gathering, 6pm at Art Freaks, across from Niles Flying A. It is also Giving Tuesday. Please come out to the membership meeting, join Niles Main Street, and support our continued events for 2026! Any new or returning members before Dec 31st will be entered into the Niles Main Street drawing happening at our January board meeting! Join! Donate! Volunteer!

Niles Main Street Association | Discover Niles Today!

I wish you all a fabulous holiday season!

Thank you Niles and beyond!

Krysten Laine, President
Niles Main Street Association