CMA Fest Has Record Attendance

Organizers Say Thursday's Weather Only Blip In 4-Day-Long Festival

POSTED: 12:12 pm CDT June 15, 2009

UPDATED: 10:23 pm CDT June 15, 2009

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The CMA Music Festival officially wrapped up Sunday night after days of non-stop country music mania. CMA officials said this weekend's celebration had the largest turnout in CMA Fest history, rising 7.2 percent.

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The association reported Monday that the average daily attendance at the four-day event was 56,000, up from 52,000 a year ago.

"A good indicator to us that things were very busy was the fact that our portable toilets were used and overused," said CMA Festival organizer Dennis Freeman. "We actually ended up ordering additional toilets during the event.

"You could tell everywhere you went downtown, that there were more people down here," said Freeman.

CMA officials credited the addition of free shows, a regional advertising push and the value of the nightly shows at LP Field as reasons for the increase despite a downturn in the economy and a general decline in festival attendance across the country.

Fences and tents from the festival were taken down Monday as organizers cleaned up.

Organizers said no serious problems were encountered during the weekend other than Thursday night's severe weather.

Despite record-breaking turnout, people who work in downtown Nashville are giving the weekend a mixed review. The all-time high turnout had local retailers hoping for the best.

"A lot of them depend on this week for a big percentage of their sales. It's almost like their Christmas,” Freeman said.

While some -- like Betty's Boots -- saw that kind of success, other Broadway businesses didn't.

"We had excellent sales. Definitely," said Carley Wilken. "I'd say it was definitely better than what we expected."

Andrew Crackel at Mike's Ice Cream said that while the business was better staffed this year for crowds, it wasn't as busy as he anticipated.

"I don't know if it was Christmas, but it might have been a birthday or something, you know," said Crackel. "When there wasn't a concert or something major going on, yeah, (the line) was to the door. It wasn’t, like, out the door and to the streets, or anything, but it was good.”

Riverfront Gifts on Broadway said it brought in less revenue than it did last year.

"Numbers-wise, people bought less stuff than last year," said Calvin Patimeteeporn.

Reporter Regina Raccuglia contributed to this story.