Big E breaks all-time attendance record, reaching over 1.5 million

Oct. 10, 2018 | Jordan Houston
jordan@thereminder.com

WEST SPRINGFIELD – For the second year in a row, The Big E has broken its all-time attendance record – this time reaching a total of 1,543,470 for 2018.

While another year of decadent fried foods, renowned entertainers and eclectic vendors has come and gone, the Eastern States Exposition is currently celebrating its new all-time attendance record, as well as its all-time highest single day attendance record – with a tally of 172,659 visitors on Sept. 22.

The Exposition beat last year’s all-time attendance record by nearly 20,000.

Noreen P. Tassinari, marketing director of the Eastern States Exposition, said the attendance record-breaking seems to be a yearly trend. She attributed this year’s highest all-time attendance record to a “combination of factors.”

“We had a diverse and really epic entertainment offering this year that reached across all genres – from country, to classic rock, to young emerging YouTube artists – and we had three stages of entertainment. That’s one factor,” she said. “In addition, people love to experience The Big E’s food. It is cited by our guests as one of many reasons they come year after year. I think that this year did not disappoint with a lot of fun, but delicious, foods.”

Some of this year’s new vendors included Stella’s Milk and Cookies; Fluffy’s Hand-Cut Donuts; Barbie’s Ice Cream; Sweet and Salty and Cranston Enterprises. New food items included the Polish Sampler Platter at Bernat’s Deli; Cinn-a-Roll Gourmet Mini Donuts at The Donut Family; Poutine Gourmet’s Pulled Pork Poutine; Shrimp Mac & Cheese at the International Lobster House & Yankee Boy; Moolicious’ Ripino in peach, orange and lemon; Italian Stuffed Peppers at Deluca’s; the Dilly Dilly Dog offered at The Giant Corn Dog; the Quesadilla Burger or Large Tater Tot Keg Kabobs at Captain Nemo’s; Bud & Burger Pub’s Gourmet Sliders with Toppings; The Coffee Break’s Deep Fried Pop Tart;  Deep Fried Corn on the Cob from The Deep South Company and Chompers’ Taco Chompers.

The Eastern States Farmers Market and Wine Barn also made its debut this year. The new addition offered fairgoers a variety of agricultural demonstrations, such as spinning and weaving, cooking demonstrations and samples from The Big E Gold Medal Cheese Competitions and The Big E Northeast Gold Wine, Cider & Perry Competition.

“We had The Big E Wine Barn, which is a beautiful barn structure,” said Tassinari. “We added the Farmers Market, which is a twin to that barn and we had excellent crowds each and every day in that area.”

Social media was another key component for this year’s attendance success, added the marketing director.

When the Fair ended, The Big E had over 225,000 followers on Facebook, more than 11.9K Twitter fans and 19.2K followers on Instagram. Facebook Live with Julie Harrison, which offered a new look at The Big E each morning, which was another accomplishment this year.

Aside from social media, targeted marketing was also used to reach larger audiences.  

“We change things every year. We greatly enhanced our website – especially our mobile website. We also did away with our app,” said Tassinari. “We took a look at our demographics, and the potential propensity for people in certain regions to visit The Big E, and focused ad dollars on those areas.”

The Big E is America’s only multi-state fair, and celebrates the history, culture and traditions of the six New England states. The 17-day fair has been dubbed as the largest fair in the Northeast, and annually draws over one million visitors every September.  

Plans for next year’s fair are already in the works, according to Tassinari.

“We start right away – analyzing this year’s fair and what changes we hope to make,” she said. “There’s nothing that can be announced at this point, but given good weather, we’re hoping that once again we reach up to over 1.5 million in attendance.”

To stay up-to-date with all the happenings at the Eastern States Exposition, head over to https://www.thebige.com/.

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