Planning started for the 2008 Festival even before the 2007 Festival ended. We found out real quick it was going to take more people and more money to run the event. The neat thing about gearing up for the festival was that every time we approached anyone for help, they said yes.

We requested a marketing grant from the Rapid City Sports Council again this year and it was approved in the amount of $5,000. We were off and running with our marketing. Thank you Rapid City Sports Council!

Once we had funding in place for marketing we hired the Robert Sharp Agency to handle all of our web site data. We were very pleased with the quality of product they provided. I think I had more comments on this web site than any other I have ever been associated with.  The Robert Sharp Agency also created and printed 2000 festival brochures that were sent out to more than 300 bicycle shops throughout the country.  Thank you to the staff at the Robert Sharp Agency for all your efforts.

Our web site received just under 300,000 visits since January. Of those, there were 7,500 unique site visitors that viewed more than one page on the web site.

We were very pleased to find out that the CVB again provided funding for advertising for the Fat Tire Festival. They created and bought advertising in Dirt Rag and Mountain Biking magazines. Both magazines have international distribution. This was by far better than any marketing piece we could afford on our own. Without these ads two or more of our sponsors probably would not have come on board. Thank you Rapid City CVB.

Several sponsors continued their support of the Black Hills Fat Tire Festival and we are grateful to each and every one of them: I want to especially thank Leonard Hernandez and Doug James of Admiral Beverage for bringing in Xzude Fitness Drinks and Common Cents as the title sponsors for the second straight year. Thank you to Specialized Bicycles for jumping on board again this year, to Bob Fuchs for offering the Firehouse Brewery for the Film Festival, to Jason Collins for selling the concept to the Corporate Board Members at First National Bank, and to Carrie Derby and staff at the Chop House for making our welcome social and barbeque perfect. Our local bicycle shops (Two Wheeler Dealer, Scheels, and ACME Bikes) for showing up and being part of this 2nd annual event, and the rest of our sponsors for sharing in our dream. Thanks!

Counting each activity we had more than 800 people either paid for part or all of the festival and activities and we had another 1500 – 2000 people either attend the festival grounds to visit the vendors or watch the races. These numbers represent more than a 300% increase in people attending part or all of the festival activities. Also, these numbers do not include the bike shops and vendor representatives from Specialized, Giant, Trek, etc., many of whom were from out of town.

Seventy-six of the 177 riders or 43% were from 75 miles outside of Rapid City. This represents a 2% increase in out of state riders over last year. We exceeded our goal of  out of state participants as well as exceeding our goal of having 300 participants in all activities for the second year.

Evaluation Forms and economic impact surveys are available on the website at www.bhfattirefestival.com . When these forms begin coming in we will have a better idea through the evaluation process of how we did and what we can do better next year.

We had participants from 16 states attending the festival including New York, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Idaho, California, Oklahoma, Missouri, North Dakota and South Dakota.

Events included three mountain bike races, freestyle exhibitions, multi-length single track tours, Mickelson Trail ride, bicycle demonstrations, Expo area, Film Festival, a world premier movie “Seasons”, as well as social activities with food drink and music.

Some of the highlights of the event (excluding the 7+ inches of rain and me falling into the creek) included the welcome social at Canyon Lake Chop House which was attended by nearly 150 people.

The First National Bank, Hill Climb, Cross Country and Super D races had 87 total participants registered in all events. All races were held in town this year which allowed more spectators to view the race and cheer their favorite rider on. Because of the rain we had to move the cross country from Saturday to Sunday as our creek crossing was washed away.  We moved the cross country race to the morning and moved the Super D to the afternoon. Riders were blown away by the challenging course that awaited them on Cowboy Hill. We gave away over $1,000 in prize money and over $3,000 in swag to our racers.  I can’t say enough about our race Director’s Ed Engler and Todd Nye.  Thanks guys you really pulled it off.



Even with the rain we had more than 25 different rides in four days and many of these had 20-30 people riding. From the preliminary feed back we have received, people were ecstatic about the trails and the rides even with rain. We had many ride leaders take a shorter course than was scheduled in order to bring the group home because of the rain. On one ride it took 2.5 hours to ride five miles and most of these riders were fairly experienced!

Everyone enjoyed themselves and beautiful surroundings, despite the weather!

The Sunday afternoon barbeque was a blast. Over 190 people attended the barbeque and those that did were treated to a fine meal from the Chop House as well as prizes galore. Many people took home prizes which totaled well over $8,000.

The Beer-Muda Triangle raffle was a big hit again this year and many prizes went out to those who spent money at our sponsors.

The 2008 Film Festival presented eight awards and had over 110 people attending. Everyone had a great time watching the award winning movies that were submitted.

The newly released movie production “Seasons” was attended by nearly 200 people. The venue at the Elks Theatre was wonderful and we had almost enough prizes for everyone.

All in all it was a good week and one that will stay in my memory for a long time!  Again thank you to all who participated, sponsored, volunteered, worked and those that just showed up to watch.  

Thanks


Jerry W. Cole, CPRP