Wagga businesses to get the party started on the block

Gather Riverina founders Rachel Fowler, Ash Gillogly and Millie Hobbs have organised the city's first The Block Party event in way of launching their business brand.

The trio created the brand, Gather Riverina, in a bid to showcase the incredible businesses across the region, starting with Wagga, from gyms, bars and cafes to retail stores.

Ms Gillogly, owner of With Love, said Gather Riverina is a platform to represent businesses and help promote them when they have events.

Ms Fowler, owner of The Press, said the trio had been exploring ways to launch the initiative for quite a while.

"We're all friends. Ash and I own businesses and Millie grew up in Wagga and we love the area," she said.

"We were observing how we didn't think Wagga gets the recognition it deserves in terms of being a tourism destination.

"We're the halfway point between Melbourne and Sydney yet we found people were choosing places like Mudgee, Jugiong and Orange to stop over at.

"We've been speaking about this for a really long time but we couldn't figure out how to get it off the ground."

That's when Works for You employee Millie Hobbs came up with the idea of the launch of a lifetime - The Block Party.

"The idea started as a way to get Gather Riverina out there to give local businesses around a presence," Ms Hobbs said.

"It was about promoting businesses and their different offerings.

"It's a celebration of Wagga."

The event will run from early morning into the night, with gyms offering deals with classes, retail hubs with cool initiatives in store for the day and bars and pubs jumping on board for the evening.

Ms Fowler said The Block Party is essentially a day and night out where people get to shop locally.

"It's a retail, hospitality and cultural celebration," she said.

"You're going to get a weekend of one-off experiences that these stores don't offer every day.

"Culturally, it's bringing businesses together which is important and it's giving residents a reason to go out and have fun.

"There will be a pilates class at Wagga Beach on Saturday morning, half-priced coffees at The Press afterwards for all the people who attended.

"Bunkr is doing a run with half-price coffees at The Press for all who attended. Pure PT is holding a morning class which is free to attend and everyone who goes will get a free margarita from The Jungle Duke Hotel either during the day or at night.

"A lot of businesses who couldn't participate on the day have donated prizes as well so we will be holding a raffle."