The 156th Wisconsin State Fair is in full-swing, having gotten off to a rousing start last Thursday. Thousands of cream puffs have been devoured, countless mops have been sold and West Allis residents are falling asleep at night to the sounds of cattle tied up for the night in the Milwaukee Mile infield.
The fair's executive director, Randy Prasse, took a few moments to sit down with OnMilwaukee.com and talk about what's new for fairgoers this year, and how the state's signature agricultural event continues to evolve.
OnMilwaukee.com: Randy, it's been a year since we last sat down and talked. What has been going on during the last 12 months?
Randy Prasse: We've turned our first profit in seven fiscal years; that's huge. Since we last sat and talked, (State Fair Park) has posted a $1.6 million profit. The Fair, itself, has always been profitable, but the park's year-round operations have been posting deficits the last seven years.
OMC: The naming-rights deal with U.S. Cellular had to have helped that number significantly.
RP: That helped a lot. That was over half of our surplus this year. There was a lot of cutting costs, too. We saved over $100,000 on energy just by cutting back and being mindful of our electricity usage. WeEnergies actually came out and did an energy audit on us at one point to find out why all of a sudden our usage was dropping so much. A lot of it was just common sense. We went around the park and shut off transformers that weren't being used throughout the year. We went around and made sure people were shutting off their computers. Really simple stuff.
OMC: Last year you talked about getting the deals done for the Pettit National Ice Center and Milwaukee Mile and how it would take those burdens off the State Fair and, in turn, bring about some added creativity for your production staff. Has that started to come to fruition?
RP: I think the prospect of creativity is coming back. I don't know how creative we have been so far in terms of refocusing our efforts on the Fair. We still have an $11 million deficit that we'll need 20 years like this last year to pay off if we're relying strictly on the programming to pay debt service.
OMC: Is that where plans like the I-94 development come into play?
RP: The magic of that is that we wouldn't sell the property to the developer, but instead we'd be doing a land lease. It could generate up to $300,000 in non-program revenue funding. The whole idea and the true benefit to that -- aside from making the Fair Park more usable during the year -- is that it adds revenue independent of program revenue.
OMC: And, in turn, that would have to bode well when the state examines the deficit situation of the Park.
RP: If we develop that, the state accepts that we're chipping away at it. Whatever that property generates would go right to eliminating that deficit so, yes, the state would be more inclined to keep its hands and eyes off what we're trying to accomplish here.
OMC: One of the big parts of the proposal would include a Bartolotta-operated dinner theater. It's an attractive piece of land, isn't it?
RP: There's not a lot of land in the area with interstate frontage along I-94 that's open for development. We should be careful when we talk about the dinner theatre because it still has to go through the RFP process, but Joe Bartolotta has been very vocal publicly about his choice of having State Fair Park be that venue. It's a pretty desirable piece of land.
OMC: Say the development plans goes through, would that hinder any further expansion of the fair? The park, itself, is fairly landlocked in there. How would any development affect the long-term plans for the fair?
RP: For all practical purposes, we're probably not going to get the green light for any new construction until our deficit is gone. New construction, in many ways, is what got us in this situation in the first place. Any new development would have to come after funding is secured. Our foundation has been reactivated and rejuvenated. And as it grows, we hope to be a partner in any capital improvement fundraising.
OMC: Last year, you talked about a new coliseum being something you saw on the long-term horizon. Does that fall into the same category?
RP: The reality is if we want a new coliseum, or want the current one overhauled and enclosed so it can be used for three seasons, is that the revenue will have to be generated from outside of the fair. It's going to take a long time before we can look at doing anything by way of new development. The thing that we made the mistake before was the buildings that should have been maintained were neglected more than they should have been. That was the scenario with the grandstand; eventually total replacement was the only option.
RP: And right next to the newer double-decker barn is the old cattle barn which is 100 years old this year. You see that barn next to a brand new one and for me; hands down the old one which has been taken care of and refurbished is more appealing than the brand new one.
OMC: There are a lot of older structures on the grounds, what kind of maintenance is going on to make them viable facilities?
RP: We've put a lot of new roofs on. The Master Spas Pavilion (cream puff building) got a new roof and brand-new air conditioning units. The horticulture building got a new roof last year, and since the 2006 Fair has been repainted and gotten upgraded electrical hook-ups. There's high-output lighting in there now. We plan to redo the bathrooms in there and we have to get a year-round heating and air conditioning unit in there. We're spending a lot of money on maintenance on buildings worthy of being maintained as opposed to doing any real new construction.
OMC: What about the vendors? A lot of people have had their set-ups on the grounds for years and years. Each Fair, it looks like a few more have done some major renovations during the off-season.
RP: Our vendor partners have been doing some major work to their stands, too. While we encourage that, we're also at a major crossroads with our utilities. We know the utilities underground are very old and tired. As we get into the new parts of the ground, those are buried and done right. There's other parts of the park where the lines are above ground and the poles have started leaning. As people talk about renovations and doing stuff to their own stands, we have to be careful. Once you open up that ground, you don't quite know what you're going to get into. It's frustrating to have people wanting to reinvest, but we have something of a minor moratorium on new building until we can get a site survey this fall that will tell us what we have underground in terms of sewer and water.
OMC: Stuff that is working well today could very much stop working, too, once you start moving things around.
RP: Exactly. Some of the outdated stuff has served us well. But you never know if you might accidentally hit something and open a whole Pandora's Box.
OMC: In the long run, though, there's going to have to be some new construction.
RP: I like to think that we'll do it right. I don't agree with some of the new construction we've had, but I know some of it had to be done. The grandstand was a serious situation because it was crumbling and falling apart. You look at Wrigley Field; it was getting to that point, too but they went in and fixed it and made things right. I wish we would have spent some more time on some buildings that are no longer here.
OMC: That was a beautiful facility, especially with the covered grandstand and the old stone construction.
RP: The history was a big part of that, for sure. The Packers' locker room was still there. And a lot of people -- including me -- still liked the covered grandstand. It would have been a real benefit for our Main Stage acts. As nice as what is currently there, it just doesn't have that same charm. But it's there, so what are you going to do? Hopefully we'll make wiser decisions going forward. Incremental development has hurt us in the past, but hopefully we're doing it right now.
RP: We don't want this to be Disney. Loosely put, I think that's what some people had in mind when they wanted this to be some sort of year-round entertainment venue. We're the Fair. It's about the different stands and the signs. It is about the freedom different vendors have to make their stands look different. It's part of the charm; part of the kitsch that makes the place so special.
OMC: One of my favorite things that we've talked about in the past is the "mental checklist" of things to do at the Fair. What are some of the things we may want to add to our lists this year?
RP: I think what I'm most excited about is the Horticulture Building. The very core of what we do here at the Fair is the competition and participation. We've taken a core program -- the Textiles, Crafts & Culinary program -- and put them into the spotlight; into their own building at our busiest intersection was a big deal. We refurbished the building and have given people an opportunity to be exposed to something they may not have otherwise had the chance to anywhere else. After demolishing the Family Living Center as part of the reconstruction, those programs got lost in the shuffle in the back of the Wisconsin Exposition Center.
OMC: It should be a good move for the program. Seeing the pies and the quilts is part of the tradition of the Fair.
RP: There's always going to be the Giant Slide, there's the cream puffs, sky glider, and the barns. About 80 percent of the people that come to the fair are from an urban environment, so I think they enjoy seeing the animals. They may not know what they're looking at or why one is better than the other, but they're seeing things they can't see anywhere else. We're trying to get to the point where we feel that we don't have to change anything and just have to make subtle adjustments to the programs.
OMC: In some ways, it's a matter of enhancing what's already there and tweaking the things that need something of a boost.
RP: For a couple years, we've had some new and exciting things. The Big Backyard was new and that was a result of the demolition of the Family Living Center and old Exhibit Halls. We never had that as a programmed area. The Westside Marketplace (now the Kitchen Craft Marketplace) three years ago was the Oriental Marketplace. So in the last three years, we've done major upgrades to the venues and added a stage with an international flare.
OMC: Have you settled into a sort of a comfort zone now that you've had a couple years to see what works and what doesn't?
RP: For my first couple years we wanted to do some pretty aggressive program changes. We didn't do it for the sake of changing it but because there were some areas that really needed some attention. Now that we're they're, I think we need to plateau and make tweaks as needed. I don't see any problems right now with the Agriculture and competitions. The food and beverage locations are terrific.
OMC: What are some of those things that still need a bit of a tweak?
RP: We try to get better at getting people in as well as making things cleaner and safer for people. I'm amazed by the number of e-mails I get by people that come to the Fair and they're amazed by how clean the park is. We take it for granted sometimes because we drive it through to everybody. Everybody on staff here is a cleaning person. When I'm walking around, I'll pick up a cup or a bottle and throw it away or in a recycling bin. People write about going to other events and festivals and fairs and they're impressed at how clean we are. Considering the number of people that come through the gates, not to mention the thousands of thousands of animals here, that's a pretty good compliment.
OMC: There aren't a lot of festivals that have to deal with the cows and pigs and sheep like you do with the Fair. Going along with the size of the crowds, it seems like even on the days when attendance is pushing the 100,000 mark, it's never too hard to walk from one end of the park to the other.
RP: There is still a flow. When we have days with 115,000 people or something along those lines, Grandstand Avenue can get a little packed. It's definitely a challenge to get that many people on 80-some acres of program space. But there is a flow.
OMC: Having the number of buildings like the Expo Center, the barns, and the Wisconsin Products Pavilion has to help that flow.
RP: There is a humongous, 200,000-sq. ft. facility for people to go into. They come in, they go through the turnstiles, but then they spread out a lot more than you can do at many other festivals. I'm amazed sometimes with the number of people we get on the grounds. The most challenging days are the first few days when we're setting up and getting things ready to go. Once we open the gates, it's actually pretty easy.
OMC: One of the things you have to notice and give credit to be the musical programming that Bruce Sullivan has put together this year. State Fair isn't going to rival the Summerfest lineup, but it really has stepped things up a notch.
RP: (Sullivan) really has. We have reconfigured the track seating to give people a better view of the stage, and also have moved the stage back to give people some better sightlines. We've also added two giant video screens so people can still see the artist. I think from a venue standpoint, we've upgraded the quality regardless of who is on stage. Then there's the lineup itself, Bruce really hit it out of the park with a couple of the headliners. It's a growing process.
OMC: The Main Stage has really been trying to find an identity over the past few years.
RP: It's moved from the old grandstand to the Central Mall back to the grandstand. It's been a stand-alone ticket, it's been free, and it's been charged partially some other years. What we're doing now is charging $30 for the really good track seats, but all the grandstand seats are just $10. We've tried to make it very affordable.
OMC: Then of course is the show I'm looking forward to, the BoDeans/Gufs show on Aug. 10. That was a pretty big coup for the State Fair. I don't remember those groups ever playing at the Fair.
RP: The BoDeans played at the old International Amphitheater early on. But literally, they've had a run of about 10 or 12 years where they really haven't played any major shows in the market except for Summerfest. For us to get them here as a part of our Wisconsin Rocks show is really very cool for us.
OMC: You mention the amphitheater; it's also undergone a bit of a repositioning, so to speak. Was that a planned change or did it just fall into place.
RP: We planned that. Bruce and I stood out there one night last year around 9:45 p.m. and there's nobody there. We had about an hour or so left in the day and there was nothing going on. We weren't doing a good job of utilizing that space. Part of the problem was it was kind of hidden. Somebody once called it the best kept secret, but I don't want there to be any secrets. Cousins Subs' sponsorship allowed us to not only upgrade the level of entertainment on the stage, but also to put up two large signs letting people know what's there.
OMC: The area has a new format, but we'll see Kids from Wisconsin, right?
RP: You bet. It's a tradition. They've been on the stage for 38 or 39 years. They're not going anywhere. It's a programmed area that's been successful, but we've tried to make it better.
