Organisers are delighted to report that over 80,000 people attended the recent 2016 Kent County Show.
Lucy Hegarty, Show Manager said, “We knew that it was going to be a great attendance number from the amount of cars in the car parks. Once the gate numbers, online ticket sales, members, exhibitors, competitors, onsite services and volunteer tickets had been tallied we were able to confirm the increased footfall.”
The Kent County Show were delighted that their Patron, HRH The Duke of Kent, KG attended on Friday 8th July. The Duke of Kent who became Patron of the Kent County Agricultural Society in 1975 has been a firm supporter over the decades, attending the Show on numerous occasions.
The Kent County Agricultural Society, organisers of the Show were also delighted to host the EU Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development Phil Hogan.
His visit marked the first public engagement between the EU Commission and the British public since the decision to leave the EU so was a really important moment to offer clarification after the recent events and address some of the uncertainties of the rural and farming communities.
Commissioner Hogan, CLA Deputy President Tim Breitmeyer and NFU President Muerig Raymond all gave speeches while the Commissioner stayed for a Q and A session with a large group of farmers and growers.
The Show organisers also reported a huge number of traffic via digital and social media preceding and during the Show, with web traffic reaching quarter of a million page views in the month leading up to the Show.
Facebook proved popular with the Show reaching 57,000 post engagements over the past 28 days. Twitter also proved popular with over 9,000 followers and almost 1,300 mentions during the three days.
Kevin Attwood, Chairman said “We are thrilled with this year’s Show, the showground looked wonderful, visitors were happy and the mostly dry weather helped to swell visitor numbers. We are slowly increasing attendance year on year which is an indication that the wider community are behind the agricultural and rural sector.”
Principal sponsor Hadlow College won an award for the Best Agricultural Trade Stand with their interactive marquee as well as taking part in floral art and sheep shearing displays.
Elsewhere on the Showground, many stands provided entertaining, educational and interactive stands that gave members of the public a chance to engage with a wide variety of activities.
The dates for the 2017 Show will be Friday 7th, Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th July 2017.
Photography credit: Thomas Alexander.