The GA Festival of Trees happens November 21 – 30, 2025 at the Gas South Convention Center, 6400 Sugarloaf Pkwy., Duluth, GA
The Atlanta Woodturners Guild will be donating a full sized, lighted and decorated tree to be auctioned at the aforementioned event to the highest bidder. The Guild will be purchasing an artificial tree, stand, lights and skirt. We are asking our Members to turn, scroll and donate enough beautiful wooden ornaments to fill a 6’ to 9’ tree. That is quite a few ornaments. If you are unable to turn ornaments, please consider donating to help with the purchases.
Below are some facts which will hopefully clarify what the GA Festival of Trees is about:
- The GA Festival of Trees (hereafter GAFOT) is a 501c3 Non-Profit which supports organizations working to end the commercial sexual exploitation of women and children in Georgia. Proceeds from the Festival go to organizations driving prevention initiatives and restorative services for countless survivors.
- Human Trafficking – The act of recruiting, transporting, transferring, harboring, or receiving individuals through force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of exploitation. This exploitation may include forced labor, sexual slavery, or other forms of commercial sexual exploitation.
- Did you know that human trafficking is a $290 million illegal industry in major US cities?
- Did you know that children and teenagers are particularly vulnerable to trafficking due to their age, naivety and trusting nature?
- Did you realize that as more children are online this enables online exploitation which can serve as a gateway to child trafficking? According to data presented by the Dept. of Justice, approximately 2 in 5 victims of sex trafficking in the US are recruited online. Homeless and runaway teens are especially vulnerable to traffickers due to desperation from poverty and lack of safety living on the streets.
- GAFOT partners with Street Grace, a faith based non-profit and Atlanta Redemption Ink, a survivor led non-profit which provides support services from a lived experience perspective.
Please bring your turned or scrolled ornaments each meeting night. The “Judging Guidelines” say that Christmas colors or winter themes sell the best. The color scheme for our tree is wood! Keep up with the cost to produce your ornaments because we will have to provide a “cost to produce” and a retail value greater than $500 to the Festival. I will have a small metal tree at the meetings so we can proudly display our ornaments and I will then store the ornaments until it is time to decorate the tree for the Festival. It is my understanding that we will get 10 tickets to the Festival. Those tickets will go to the 10 top producers of ornaments in the Club. Thank you for your participation. AWG is going to rock the GA Festival of Trees and do what it can to help annihilate Human Trafficking in our State.