The second annual Orlando Wine Festival & Auction scheduled to take place this weekend has been postponed indefinitely due to concerns about the coronavirus pandemic.
The event, sponsored by the Orlando Magic and benefitting its Youth Foundation, was to begin Friday, March 13, with a series of wine dinners cooked by local and national chefs in private homes. A grand tasting on Saturday at the Ritz-Carlton Grande Lakes was to be followed by a dinner at the hotel by celebrity chef Michael Symon and a live auction expected to raise tens of thousands of dollars.
The weekend was to conclude with a Magic game at the Amway Center in downtown Orlando. Wednesday night, the NBA announced that the remainder of the basketball season was suspended, so that element of the wine event had already been deleted.
Approximately 600 people were expected to attend the ultra high-end wine event where ticket packages started at $2,500 per couple and ranged to $9,250. The live auction was to include private concert with Boyz II Men, an African safari, and trips to Bordeaux and the Champagne region in France.
The inaugural Orlando Wine Festival & Auction raised over $900,000 for the Orlando Magic Youth Foundation, which deals with local at-risk kids.
This story is developing.