HUTCHINSON, Kan. — The agreement for the new Foundation Event Venue for the Kansas State Fairgrounds was passed by the Kansas State Fair Board.
"It will be a food and beverage venue during the fair," said James Fisher with the Fairgrounds Foundation. "Non-Fair times, it's going to be available for rent for special events and activities that the fair puts on, the foundation puts on, as well as other businesses and things in the community. Large weddings, corporate events, meetings, it will have a really nice catering kitchen. It's not going to have a full cooking kitchen it, but we have been visiting with some of the top caterers in Hutchinson, as well as ones out of Wichita, giving us ideas on what they would want and expect when they walk into the door from a catering standpoint, also knowing that we are going to need to use that kitchen to prepare food during the 10 days of the Fair."
The new building will be where the current old Fine Arts building is and will be an open floor plan with a permanent stage, bar counter and the catering kitchen, and it will be temperature controlled. It will have a liquor license.
"The Foundation will manage that during the fair," Fisher said. "One of the cool things is that all of the money the Foundation makes actually gets invested back into the fair. It doesn't leave the Fairgrounds. It gets put right back into improvements and things on the fairgrounds. Rather than the percentage that a normal vendor would take and that would be a part of their income for the year that money will be invested back into the fair to do additional improvements."
The venue is expected to generate up to $200,000 a year, and the initial startup cost is significant.
"The Foundation Board and the State Fair Board have agreed upon, we have a budget of not to exceed $5.6 million on this project. It's bigger than what we'd originally talked about, but we're also having to do some other additional things to make the facility what we want it to be and to make it stand out from other venues in the area."
The hope is to get smaller acts in for concerts in the venue, too.
"It should seat about 1000 people, theater style," Fisher said. "We will be able to put in a stage, bring in lighting and sound and do a great event from that standpoint, with small concerts, people coming through the region that we want to bring in, non-Fair, as well."
The goal is to have the event venue open before the 2024 State Fair.