PORT ANGELES – The North Olympic Peninsula has more than its share of community festivals – in fact, about 50 events make it the per capita festival capital of Washington.
“We are an amazing festival community,” said Scott Nagel, a producer of festivals and president of the fair and exposition consulting firm Birchhill Enterprises, which conducts follow-up surveys for festivals throughout the nation.
“There’s no other smaller community in Washington state that works like this,” he told an audience of about 50 attending Monday’s Port Angeles Regional Chamber of Commerce weekly luncheon at the Port Angeles CrabHouse Restaurant.
Events such as the Dungeness Crab & Seafood Festival and Juan de Fuca Festival of the Arts in Port Angeles and the Sequim Lavender Festival have grown in popularity, particularly with visitors from beyond the North Olympic Peninsula, he said.
Nagel is co-producer of the crab and lavender festivals.
The lavender festival, for example, tallied 56 percent of its total attendance of people who reside 50 miles away or greater in 2005, according to surveys conducted by Birchhill Enterprises.
That figure was 62 percent in 2002, Nagel said.
Port Angeles’ Juan de Fuca Festival, held annually during the three-day Memorial Day weekend, logged 23 percent of its total attendance from beyond the 50-mile range in 2005, and 28 percent in 2002.
“It is rare for a festival to have more than 15 percent [from elsewhere],” Nagel said.
“These are the highest [percentages] I’ve ever seen.”
