Organised by the Crikvenica Tourist Board and the Kvarner Wines Association, the International Sparkling Wine Festival Crikvenica #JustSparkle has been held.
The best measure of the success of the festival, staged on Friday and Saturday, is the many satisfied guests who filled Crikvenica’s main square across the two evenings, and the fact that on the second day of the “feast of bubbles” the winemakers had sold almost all their wine by the close of the event. Beyond being good promotion for the destination and for sparkling wine, it was also an opportunity for producers to be paid directly for their product.
“In launching the Just Sparkle festival we wanted to take a step forward in developing Crikvenica’s tourism offering and to create an event that would further position our destination on the map of top food-and-wine happenings. The festival showed that there is genuine interest in precisely this concept — a combination of outstanding sparkling wines, gastronomy, music and a unique setting by the sea. We are especially pleased that visitors recognised the idea behind the festival and that the square took on exactly the atmosphere we had hoped for: relaxed, elegant and full of life. Events of this kind enrich the destination, extend guests’ stays and create added value for local restaurateurs, winemakers and all the partners involved. Just Sparkle was never conceived as a one-off, but as a festival that will grow and develop year on year and become one of the recognisable symbols of summer in Crikvenica,” said Marijana Biondić, director of the Crikvenica Tourist Board.
Kvarner today has the knowledge, the content, the partners and the organisational capability to develop premium food-and-wine products that go beyond the framework of a conventional event and become a tool of strategic destination management.
When you gather in one place the finest Croatian sparkling wines, relevant international labels, Kvarner sparklers made from indigenous varieties, and gastronomy and surroundings that meet the expectations of the contemporary guest, then we are no longer talking merely about an event but about a model for how destination value is built, noted Dr Žarko Stilin, going on to say that the particular value of this project lies in its being realised in the year when Kvarner holds the title of European Region of Gastronomy 2026, which lends it additional developmental and promotional weight. Content of exactly this kind confirms that Kvarner knows how to turn its own wine, gastronomic and tourism resources into a professionally managed, commercially relevant and internationally legible product.
In that context Stilin also sees the festival developing further through the Kvarner Wines Route platform, which is being built within the Iter Vitis network, since such a connection opens up additional room for Kvarner in terms of international visibility, cooperation and positioning within the European cultural and food-and-wine map.
He adds that the aim is clear — to create offerings of higher added value, raise the quality of the guest’s stay and build Kvarner as a destination people come to not only for the sea and the season, but for the experience, the identity and the standard. We undertake projects like this first and foremost for our guests from Croatia, Europe and the wider world, but also for ourselves as their hosts, because only a destination that knows how to offer authenticity, quality and emotion can build loyalty and repeat visits over the long term. #JustSparkle therefore matters not only as a successful project but as a clear indicator of the direction Kvarner should take — towards premium tourism, international relevance and a stronger destination identity.
“Kvarner must be a destination people come to not by chance but for a reason — and one the guest returns to because here they experienced something more.”
