McCosh Park pigout records larger numbers

MOSES LAKE — The coordinator behind the second annual Pigout in McCosh Park said the weekend-long event went well.

"The entertainment was wonderful," Bill Burke of Veradale-based Burke Marketing said. "Moses Lake really likes nostalgia. A combination of the Beach Boys, the Monkees and Beatles, how much more nostalgia can you get?"

Fun, Fun, Fun was a tribute show to the three bands which took place as a headliner concert Friday evening.

Audiences came earlier and were larger, according to Burke, which translated into better food sales.

"As we continue to do Pigout, we're defining the market a little bit more and what the opportunities are going to be in the future," he said.

Certain characteristics about the community need to be taken under consideration, such as the difficulty to attract a Sunday audience. Burke said Moses Lake is a strong church and family community, which means the day is spoken for quite often.

In the future, he said, the marketing company will look at turning the event into a two-day event, or keeping it a three-day event.

It looks like 15 to 20 vendors is the right number, based on the size of the market, Burke said.

He keeps track of numbers through a system each day, he explained.

The whole summer concert season has been drawing more people, Burke noted. Due to stronger marketing, the series is drawing audiences from a larger region, including Wenatchee, Yakima, the Tri-Cities and Seattle, Burke said.

"That's the idea, to grow it and so we're seeing a lot of people we have not seen before," he said. "These concerts are beginning to take on the personality of a paid-venue concert: More adults, larger audiences, a little more diverse from economic and social strata."

The ability to put on such concerts without charging admission is due to efforts by the City of Moses Lake and corporate citizens offering revenue sources, Burke explained.

He heard positive things about headline concerts Fun, Fun, Fun and the Pirates of the Mississippi.

"It's obvious the favorite attraction at the event this year was the Beach Boy and Beatles (concert), because I heard about it everywhere I went," he said. "Last year was Sha Na Na — last year we did the 1950s, this year we did the 1960s, look out, here we come into the 1970s."

Because vendors did well and entertainment response did well, Burke said he and the city and its various departments will look things over at the end of the series in determining where to take the event and the series next year.

"This is a good summer in Moses Lake," Burke said. "There's a lot of activity, not just what we're doing in the park, but boat races, major meetings and fairs and stuff … Things are happening in Grant County."