Attendance down slightly at BC Youth Fair
Published 8:58 am Friday, August 22, 2014
Attendance and exhibitors were down slightly at this year’s Berrien County Youth Fair, according to a report released Thursday by fair secretary Karen Klug.
A total of 122,596 people visited the fair during the week of Aug. 11-16. That number was down 2,177 people from the 124,773 who visited the fair in 2013 during a week of exceptionally good weather.
“We are very pleased with the attendance,” Klug said. “We had a good crowd other than on Tuesday.”
Rain Monday and Tuesday helped contribute to a dip in attendance at this year’s fair, especially on children’s day (Tuesday), which saw attendance plummet 12,000 from the year prior.
Klug said they had a good bounce back in attendance the rest of the week due in part to sunny and cool weather.
A total of 2,265 exhibitors (down 225 from 2013) entered 12,528 exhibits (down 2,411 from 2013) to showcase throughout the week. Berrien County Youth ages five through 20 brought livestock, dogs, cats, pocket pets, crafts, horticulture, flowers and home economics exhibits to fill more than 20 barns with exhibits for fairgoers to view.
Klug reported that American Idol winner Scott McCreery drew the largest crowd of all the events in the grandstand.
Small and large animal livestock auctions saw a total of $520,125 change hands.
Klug thanked all the people who came to the fair.
“We hope you enjoyed our youth exhibits, commercial exhibits, free attractions, grandstand shows and fair food,” she said. “Your suggestions are always welcome — even consider joining one of our 70 committees and become a Berrien County Youth Fair volunteer.”
More than 1,000 volunteers helped make the 69th annual Berrien County Youth Fair run smoothly.
Next year the fair will celebrate its 70th edition Aug. 17-22 with a blue ribbon bash.