HOT PURSUIT
I’ll admit I love a great fair. And two of them pop right to the top of my list—the Minnesota State Fair and of course, the Steele County Free Fair, Minnesota’s largest county fair.
I was a little disgusted with this past weekend’s announcement from the Minnesota State Agriculture Association that it would be raising its ticket prices once again for this year’s State Fair. The cost to get in the gate will now become $18 for adults, a $1 increase over last year’s price.
After COVID-19 knocked out the fair in 2020 and scaled it back in 2021, the State Fair has come along with price increases for the past two years.
State Fair officials say the increases are due to inflation, public safety, facilities needing updating and other services such as the free Park & Ride System with Metro Transit.
Meanwhile, our neighbors to the south at the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines are raising their ticket price by $2 to $11 for advance and $16 at the gate.
My fear is that fair officials are going to make the fair experience for families difficult to achieve as family budgets keep tightening up. Inflation has spiraled out of control in the past couple years and quite simply families have less to spend.
In Minnesota’s case, it will be $68 just for a family of four to get in the gate. Add a $3 increase to $20 for fair parking, it will take almost a $100 bill just to park and walk in the grounds.
How long is it going to be before families decide they simply can’t afford to go to the State Fair?
It’s a valued tradition that I hope fair officials don’t continue to price themselves out of the rich attendance they’ve enjoyed for years.
Which brings me back to the Steele County Fair. The free gate makes this stop probably the best value a family could ever enjoy. The local fair has offered free admission for almost 100 years dating back to 1927.
There is no arguing that the free admission has led to Steele County becoming the largest county fair in the state. Over the years the Steele fair has posted some impressive attendance estimates, including the record of 350,899 in 2013.
Citing reasons of inefficiencies in the formula used to come up with attendance, the Steele fair has decided to not issue an estimated attendance figure moving forward.
Dan Deml, president of the Steele fair, has said in the past that being free is one of the biggest reasons attendance swells as high as it does. “We’re a free fair, and we have lots of free entertainment,” he told me last summer. “There is a lot of free entertainment for all ages of the family. We offer a good value.”
My home fair in McLeod County has also jumped on the free bandwagon. Last summer for the first time ever, the fair went to a free gate and saw one of the largest crowds ever. It is planning to remain free for at least the next several years.
Thankfully, we have fair officials in greater Minnesota that are looking out for families and keeping things on the affordable end.
I’m not suggesting boycotting the State Fair, but it makes you wonder why one would make that trip into the crime-ridden area of the Twin Cities when there is just as great entertainment here in southern Minnesota for considerably less money.
Steele County has a great thing going, and I hope officials go in hot pursuit of keeping it that way for years to come.