News

A message from Festival Director, Matt Sullivan

August 7, 2012

Just wanted to send along a note of thanks to all who helped us make the 9th Annual Great American Irish Festival another success. Frankly, I'm getting tired of people saying that, "It just wouldn't be the GAIF without rain!" However, despite the Saturday rain, we had a very good weekend nonetheless. We were up on Friday and Sunday, and the collection at Mass was easily the largest ever. (That, by the way, gets distributed to local food pantries by the AOH.) To my knowledge, we experienced only minor problems which were promptly and deftly handled. There are high marks for all venues, far too numerous to mention individually.

We just returned with our small contingent from the Dublin Irish Festival (near Columbus Ohio), which is regarded as the 2nd largest in the country for attendance. Similar to my trip to Milwaukee last fall (which is the largest event) I had some thoughts to share with you. It is nearly imposssible to not be dazzled with the size and scope of these events, which have been around much longer than we have. They are very impressive on many levels, and we've stolen more than a few ideas from them to incorporate into our fest. However, as we Americans are constantly conditioned that bigger is always better, that isn't quite the case. We continue to hear from bands, vendors, and festival-goers how much they enjoy the more personal feel of our fest, and how things get lost in the shuffle at the big ones. There is something to that. Not only is it impractical, if not impossible, for us to ever handle the volume of people that these events have, but it's also not the answer.

We can continue to grow our numbers a bit, but more importantly, we need to focus on continuing what we're known for: tremendous volunteers, top notch entertainment, value, outstanding hospitality, and attention to detail. Quality before quantity. There are a number of exciting changes being considered for our 10th anniversary in 2024. We're excited about the next fest and hope you are too. Thanks once again and we hope you'll be with us for our 10th.

Matt