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Saturday, November 21, 2009
Revenues Down at 2009 State Fair
By Charles D. Brunt
Copyright © 2009 Albuquerque Journal
Journal Staff Writer
Despite a slight increase in attendance, the 2009 New Mexico State Fair saw a dip in revenues, due largely to a drop in paid attendance and an increase in the number of fairgoers who got in for free, fair officials said Friday.
The lagging economy and trade-outs with sponsors fed an 8.4 percent drop in revenues for this year's Sept. 11-27 state fair, compared to the 2008 fair.
Paid attendance fell from $2.2 million in 2008 to $1.7 million this year. Unpaid attendance increased by 61.1 percent.
"What that is is our sponsorships," general manager Craig Swagerty said. "Sponsors always come forth with cash and (in-kind) services, but in this economic climate that we're in, they just didn't have it.
"We didn't want to lose any of our sponsors because most of them have been with us for years and years. We wanted to work with them and do what we could. It was better to have them doing some sort of in-kind sponsorship to keep them than it was to lose them," he said.
Typically, a sponsor receives more than the value of their cash donation or in-kind services in free admission, concert or rodeo tickets, said State Fair communications director Michael Henningsen, But that ratio can vary widely, he said, and sometimes favors the fair.
Although the lion's share of such trade-outs go to catering services and hotel rooms for people like out-of-town contest judges, entertainers and junior livestock auction participants, they also cover things like parking lot striping, professional office services and even loaned campers to accommodate fair staffers who need to be on the fairgrounds 24/7 during the fair, he said.
"The only bargaining chips that we have are admission tickets and concert tickets. That's what we're able to give back in trade for sponsorships," Henningsen said.
In 2008, 446,189 fairgoers paid admission to the fair, and 156,315 got in for free, according to State Fair figures. This year, 359,375 people paid to get in, and 611,231 walked in for free.
Henningsen also said Mega Ride passes, in which fairgoers buy discounted tickets that get them into the fair and let them ride all the carnival rides they want for a day, also affected paid attendance. If Mega Ride pass holders leave the fair and return later in the day, they are counted as a paid admission only once, he said.
Total revenues for the 2009 fair were $5.1 million, compared to about $5.6 million last year.
Swagerty, who was named general manager in April, said he'll be looking for ways to boost attendance and revenues next year.
"One of the things we're looking at is our stand-alone concerts," he said, which didn't post the numbers fair officials hoped for. This year's stand-alones — meaning they're not preceded by a PRCA rodeo in Tingley Coliseum — were country act Montgomery Gentry on the fair's opening night and classic rock band Huey Lewis & The News the following night.
"We're looking at something different there," Swagerty said. "I don't know if we'll do a rodeo or something else. But we're trying to cut our costs and still provide entertainment. We have to do that."
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