Business off the beaten path: Crowds escape from the cities to embrace some quirky festivals and fun

It's spring in the Southwest and vendors are serving up ostrich burgers, deep-fried rattlesnake and good ol' fashioned strawberry shortcake at the biggest little spots you've never heard of.

Savvy carnival providers say the growth of megapolitan areas has helped build attendance at such quirky events as the Chandler Ostrich Festival in Arizona, the Freer Rattlesnake Round-Up and Poteet Strawberry Festival in Texas and the Garden Grove Strawberry Festival in California.

Danny Brown, co-owner of Brown's Amusements with his wife, Sherry, calls the Chandler Ostrich Festival "the biggest festival in Arizona and pretty famous in this part of the country." Brown's produced the 18th annual edition, held March 10-12, for the local chamber of commerce, with entertainment including Joan Jett, the Village People, the Little River Band and a Fiesta Day with Mexican bands.

The signature attraction is Hedrick Promotions' ostrich chariot races and the jockeys who ride the 7-foot-tall birds, sometimes bareback.

In 2003, the Browns helped this celebration of the area's history of ostrich ranching make the transition from a free downtown festival to a ticketed event ($5-$7, plus $5 parking) that now draws more than 100,000 to Chandler's new Tumbleweed Park.

This year, Brown's brought in 35 rides, including pieces from Butler Amusements, Davis Enterprises, Demas Enterprises, Kastl Amusements and Sun Valley Rides. A $69 advance-sale Family Fun Pack included admission and carnival passes for two adults and two kids.

Among the 150 food and merchandise vendors who came from throughout the Southwest and Southern California were purveyors of ostrich meat and carved emu eggs. "There's still room for new vendors. Every year we change them up," Danny Brown says.



The heart of Texas

Mary Bell of Fairplay Promotions in Hayward, Texas, notes that her Lone Star State has festivals celebrating just about everything: say, alligators (the Sept. 15-17 Texas Gatorfest in Anahuac), mosquitoes (the July 27-29 Great Texas Mosquito Festival in Clute) and shrimps (the June 2-4 Shrimporee, the 58th annual, in Aransas Pass).

"I don't think there's an animal, except the wolf, that doesn't have a festival," she says.

But Bell's vote for the biggest little spring spot anywhere is the April 7-9 Poteet Strawberry Festival. "It has grown from practically nothing, and it's just a little bitty town (pop. 3,305)," she says.

Attendance at the Poteet festival is 150,000-200,000, according to Gary Denton of San Antonio-based Alamo Attractions, which holds the ride contract. "It's the proximity to San Antonio (20 minutes away), and we do a bang-up job in advertising and just work as a team, giving them ride specials and armbands on Thursday and dollar rides on Fridays," says Denton, who brings in about 60 rides. "There will be myself, Michael Wood, Jim Przybcke, Crabtree Amusements and Wade Shows."

"You can make as much in four days in Poteet as you can in three weeks in some places," adds Joyce Hutchins, a general manager with indie ride operator Wood Entertainment, who has played the spot for more than a decade. "It gets bigger every year."

Hutchins will be there this year with Wood's Magnum and Technopower as well as Flight to Mars' Storm, which she co-owns with Bill Hensley.

This year, Denton has added to his spring route the May 12-14 Freer Rattlesnake Round-Up formerly played by Moore's Greater Shows. The $10 gate includes a daredevil snake show and nationally known country and Tejana entertainment.

"It's been a real big event in South Texas for about 30 years," Denton says. "We'll bring in 25-30 rides and see if we can't speed it up a bit and boost attendance."

At last year's roundup, which drew more than 20,000, vendors sold more than 650 pounds of battered and deep-fried rattlesnake.

"You go through the town (pop. 3,241) and your first impression is, this isn't going to be much. Well, the people come out from the woodwork," says Rocky Scholfield of Icon Amusements, which has played Freer with her rock wall and quad power jump, which she co-owns with Dean Lawton.

"It's a real experience. They got through mowing the area where we were setting up, and the guy said, 'Watch out for the rattlesnakes.' He wasn't kidding. At this show, they carry rattlesnake serum," Scholfield says.



Berry, berry good

Another big little spot mentioned by Hutchins is the May 26-29 Garden Grove (Calif.) Strawberry Festival, which has a new carnival, Ray Cammack Shows, as it heads into its 48th year. "RCS is bringing in over 40 rides and all of the food," RCS marketing director Tony Fiori says.

Formerly played by B&B, last year's Strawberry Festival had an estimated attendance of 250,000 and a ride gross of $400,000. According to organizers, the four-day Memorial Day event is now the second-largest volunteer community festival in the western U.S., exceeded only by the Rose Festival in Portland, Ore. The festival's parade draws Hollywood celebrities, including young film and TV stars who attend for the charitable group Kids With a Cause.

Patty Pollard, who has been selling hand-dipped ice-cream bars at fairs and festivals in Alaska for 23 years, says she's awed by the Arctic Man festival, which takes place the first week in April in the Summit Lake area near Paxson, 175 miles southeast of Fairbanks.

"A whole city (13,000) shows up to party and camp for one week with RVs in the middle of nowhere," she says. "They plow the snow away at the base of these unbelievable mountains."

The festival's slogan — "Go Fast, or Go Home!" — refers to the race in which skiers get towed by snowmobiles over the mountains and then free-ski to the finish line.

"There are vendors with bratwurst, ice cream and coffee. There's so many people that you could sell to, but the hardships of being a vendor at Arctic Man is something else," Pollard says. Why? There's no water, no power and no sewer, and you have to bring all of the product you plan to sell because it takes a good four hours to drive there.

Bob Jackson, owner of Chicken Charlies' Broasted Chicken, sings the praises of Spirit West Coast, a Christian music festival held at the Del Mar fairgrounds during Memorial Day weekend. It draws 13,000-17,000 per day.

"There's a few of us that also do the San Diego County Fair that come in for that show, which is in its third year. They called and asked us if we'd be interested," Jackson says.

Carmel Dyer, whose Australian battered potatoes are a top grosser at Del Mar, gets back from the Sydney Royal Easter Show in time for Spirit West Coast. "You can do as good at a few-day festival as you will at a fair if they get the numbers," she notes.

The music festival also makes a stop Aug. 3-5 in Monterey, Calif., where it attracts 16,500-18,600 visitors a day.

Steve and Jackie Swika's S&S Amusements will open their season April 24 at the North Scranton Rotary in Dickson City, Pa., but their carousel already went for a spin at the Jan. 7-14 Pennsylvania Farm Show, the largest indoor agricultural event in the country.

"Each year a different carnival that's a member of the Pennsylvania Showmen's Assn. will be asked to donate their carousel for the eight-day show," says Steve Swika, who notes that the ride raised more than $35,000 in scholarship funds to be divided equally between the farm show and the showmen's association.

While the carousel was the only carnival ride at the show, Swika says there are opportunities for food vendors to work under the auspices of one of the agricultural groups. "There's people with bloomin' onion and fried veggies working with the vegetable growers' association. There's people with funnel cakes and rice pudding. It's all set up in food courts," Swika says.

The winter extravaganza drew an estimated 500,000 to Harrisburg's 25-acre Farm Show complex. o