With National Day Parade (NDP) rehearsals in full swing, many head to City Hall and Marina Bay to enjoy the fireworks and various other events celebrating Singapore's 60th birthday.

Just a short distance away from the festivities, however, vendors at a carnival in Bayfront are getting increasingly worried due to lack of business.

In a TikTok posted on Thursday (July 31), Hazel Chen, co-owner of local food venture KwazyKorndog, detailed the situation at the Singapore National Day Food Festival 2025.

"We are on the verge of losing $10k at this event and we need your help," she said.

@kwazykorndog

We are on the verge of losing 10k in this event.. please help 🥺

♬ stellar - .diedlonely & énouement

According to the TikTok video, their sales ranged from $14 to $32 a day with the exception on the first day, when they made $560.

The lack of business means that that Chen and her husband, Jay Lam, could not cover the daily rent of $500 for their stall and were suffering losses almost every day.

The couple told AsiaOne on Friday (Aug 1) that while there was a small, organic crowd at the event on the day of NDP rehearsals, sales could not cover the vendors' rental costs.

Chen and Lam, who are 28 and 30 respectively, stated that they had agreed to participate in the event as it was held at the Bayfront event space — a "great spot" with "a mix of locals and tourists" in their experience.

They also thought that the event being marketed as a National Day celebration would result in higher footfall during the weekend.

However, this was not the case.

"On the second day, there were literally less than a hundred people (at the event) the whole day. No one could make more than $50 a day," they said.

"There was supposed to be live performances to bring in a crowd, but it only happened on Sunday (July 27) and very sadly, he was playing for no one."

Feedback given to organiser

The duo also spoke to fellow vendors and realised that some elderly stall owners "felt helpless" as they did not know how to use social media and were completely dependent on the organisers as a result.

When asked if they relayed the feedback that they and other vendors had to the event organiser, the couple said that they did so on the second day of the event.

"They only responded and started doing things like adding more lights, printing banners. But we feel like these things should have been done prior to the event. We feel the onus is on the organiser to market the event," they said.

AsiaOne has reached out to the event organiser for more information.

Online support is 'heartwarming'

Stating that they felt "dejected" and "helpless" as operating KwazyKorndog is their full-time job and they stand to lose an entire months' earnings from other events, they decided to post about the matter on TikTok.

"We didn't expect it to blow up," said the duo. The video has garnered over 432,000 views as at Friday.

"It was heartwarming to see a few customers who purposely came to buy from us yesterday (July 31) after our video went viral. But we will have to see if there will be an increase in customers this weekend."

Chen and Lam also acknowledged comments under their video which pointed out that the event crowd is "dying" as the economy is bad.

"As we make a living out of events, we may have to think about pivoting to something else to mitigate our risks. This is also a huge lesson for us," they said.

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bhavya.rawat@asiaone.com