News

Luehrs’ Ideal Rides will return to the Boone County(Indiana) Fairgrounds July 27-30, 2009

Posted by CarnivalMidways.Com on December 16, 2008
Posted in: News. Tagged: , .

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By Rod Rose/The Lebanon Reporter
Lebanon — As carnivals go, this summer’s Boone County 4-H fair will be ideal.

Luehrs’ Ideal Rides will appear at the Boone County Fairgrounds July 27-30, 2009.

The Boone County Fair Board last week approved a preliminary schedule for the annual event, said Tony Carrell, Extension Educator for 4-H Youth Development.

Jessup Amusements, which had been at the previous 11 fairs, announced in December 2007 it wouldn’t be back for 2008. Other carnivals were already booked.

Luehrs’ officials visited the fairgrounds last year, Carrell said.

Luehrs’ run will start after the fair opens on Friday, July 24. Luehrs, based in Belleville, Ill., was established in 1957; the carnival is a multiple winner of the Outdoor Amusement Business Association’s “Circle of Excellence” award.

Carrell said Luehrs is booked for July 24-25. The carnival will remain open for one day after the fair closes, he said.

Adding a carnival and shuffling some of the scheduled events were among public suggestions made at the 2008 fair, the first to be held over a full weekend.

“We knew going into it last year there would likely be some changes and modifications during the second year,” Carrell said Monday. “Hopefully next year the changes will be very minimal.”

Other changes for the 2009 Fair include:

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Matt’s Carnival Warehouse Releases the Top 50 Fairs of 2008

Posted by CarnivalMidways.Com on December 16, 2008
Posted in: News. Tagged: , .

North Americas Top 50 experience only a 2% decrease from 2007
By MCW Staff
Besure to visit MCW to download the full list.

North America’s Top 50 fairs held their own in 2008, dropping only 2% from 41,468,926 in 2007 to 40,670,657 in 2008 in a year that posed difficult challenges.

Chief among the concerns for 2008 was the price of fuel. Guests at North America’s largest events can travel many miles to attend the event and managers were concerned fuel prices would adversely affect business, both in terms of cost of travel and the amount of money available to spend.

The year started out well with several early fairs posting significant gains. In January and February, the South Florida Fair in West Palm Beach and the Florida State Fair we up 2% and 7% respectively. In the west, the national Western Show was up 4% in Denver in January and the San Antonio Livestock Show and Exhibition was up 8% in February.

By July and August, the year looked promising with fairs such as the Iowa State Fair posting an 11% increase and the Top 50’s biggest gainer, the Illinois State Fair, posting a whopping 21% increase!

As Labor Day came and the fall fair season started however, many fairs fell victim to inclement weather. Perennial powerhouses New Mexico State Fair, York (PA) Fair and the Big E all posted double digit drops of 19%, 17% and 14% respectively. October saw more of the same with the Arizona State Fair, The North Carolina State Fair, Mississippi State Fair and the South Carolina State Fair all showing losses in attendance numbers.

The fall was not without its bright spots however. The Arkansas State Fair and the State Fair of Louisiana were both up 6%.

The top three fairs for 2008, the Texas State Fair, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo (1,802,158), the Minnesota State Fair (1,693,553) held their respective places but the Canadian National Exhibition (1,310,000) moved into the fourth place spot with a 6% increase over 2007, replacing the Los Angeles County Fair (1,303,655), which fell to fifth place.

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Couple’s book about fairs is a slice of Americana

Posted by CarnivalMidways.Com on December 15, 2008
Posted in: News. Tagged: .

By John Weiss
Post-Bulletin, Rochester MN

Conventional wisdom is wrong — you can judge a book by its cover.

The front of “Purebred & Homegrown: America’s County Fairs” shows four children chatting outside the Rice County 4-H Revue Center in Lyons, Kan., ready to show their sheep at the county fair.

It’s a simple picture, deceptively simple.

Drake Hokanson and Carol Kratz of La Crosse, Wis., spent 10 years doing research on 90 fairs in 35 states for their new book, Purebred & Homegrown: Americas County Fairs.
Drake Hokanson and Carol Kratz of La Crosse, Wis., spent 10 years doing research on 90 fairs in 35 states for their new book, ”Purebred & Homegrown: America’s County Fairs.”

Photographically, fairs can be a gold mine with the flashing lights of carnivals, the thrills of demolition derbies or action of horse races. Instead, the husband-wife team of Drake Hokanson and Carol Kratz of La Crosse, Wis., chose that picture.

It tells you what you need to know about what’s inside. It’s a book about America and what it once was, what it is now, and what it will be. Sizzle and hyperactivity would be wrong for what they write.

That’s the point, said Hokanson, a Winona State University mass communications professor. Fairs are timeless. They have changed from horse to tractors or cars, but the basics remain — they are places where people meet, talk, have commercial exhibits, compete for prizes in livestock, the best jellies and canned pickles. Stories and pictures about slices of pies are stories about slices of America.

Photographically, he said he would “look for that which was deeply true about the American county fair than that what was newsworthy. We were looking for what was perpetual at the fair.”

The couple spent 10 years doing research on 90 fairs in 35 states. Hearing them talk about it and reading their stories, it seems they had way too much fun to call it research.

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Fair conflict: It’s a serious thing

Posted by CarnivalMidways.Com on December 14, 2008
Posted in: News. Tagged: .

Tri-City Herald
The North Franklin School District thought it was getting out in front when it settled its school calendar for next year early.

Unfortunately, there was an unintended consequence. The district ran right into the Benton Franklin Fair & Rodeo. Anyone who thinks this is a trivial matter is wrong.

Fairs, like schools, are important business.

The district set school to start Aug. 25, the same day the fair opens. Since so many North Franklin students participate in the fair, and many work as hard on their animals and exhibits as on their school work, this was a big problem.

The North Franklin district serves Connell, Eltopia, Mesa, Basin City and lots of real estate in between.

The school district and its teachers union set the dates last winter.

Now North Franklin Superintendent Gregg Taylor told the Herald’s Franny White that the district will have to consider changing it.

“We have a significant number of students that do FFA and 4-H,” Taylor said. “It would be a real hard challenge to start school without those kids being there.”

Moving the fair dates is not an option. They are allocated by the state Department of Agriculture years in advance following a rigid schedule. The fair will be Aug. 25-29 next year. As always, it will end on the weekend before Labor Day weekend.

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Powers Great American Midways will Return to Raleigh, N.C. in 2009

Posted by CarnivalMidways.Com on December 12, 2008
Posted in: News. Tagged: , , .

WakeMyNC

Powers Great American Midways will operate the carnival rides and games at the 2009 N.C. State Fair, Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler announced.

Troxler said he and State Fair management chose to offer the contract to Powers for 2009 based on the company’s performance at the past three State Fairs, as well as the financial benefit to the state. State regulations allow the State Fair to enter into a one-year contract with a carnival company without taking bids.

“We’ve got a carnival contract that’s as good as, or better than, any state fair in the country,” Troxler said.

State Fair Manager Wesley Wyatt and Les Powers, president of Powers Great American Midways, signed the contract today (Dec. 11).

The Pender County-based company will pay the state $5.50 for each person who buys an admission ticket to the 2009 State Fair, the same base rate as this year. The contract will again include a provision that allows Powers to lower its payment 20 cents per person by bringing in two rides that are not more than 24 months old and have never played the N.C. State Fair before. The company qualified for the discount this year by bringing in several new rides, including the Mind Blaster and Vortex.

The N.C. State Fair is a self-supporting entity that does not rely on legislative appropriations to operate. The State Fair uses the carnival company’s payment and other revenues for fairgrounds operations and improvements.

The 2009 State Fair will take place Oct. 15-25.

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