Mike Parker: When a plan comes together
When a plan comes together
As the fictional Col. John “Hannibal” Smith, leader of the A-Team, was known to say: “I love it when a plan comes together.” These words best describe the intense effort and planning that goes into making Kinston’s BBQ Fest on the Neuse a success year after year. This year marked the 44th year our city has put on the festival.
Imagine, if you can, the preparation needed to accommodate 106 cook teams, 160 vendors, the R&D Amusements Carnival Kids’ Fest in Flimsy’s Fun Zone – not to mention the biggest classic car and truck show in the history of our festival.
Planners must coordinate the needs of musical performers such as Runaway June, Southern Misfits, the British Invaders Band, and the No Quarter Brass Band. Add to that the Bikers for Christ and performers from several dance schools. Planning includes shuttle times and stops and off-site parking since the streets are closed to traffic in the festival area.
Planners must secure law enforcement, and the Kinston Police and Lenoir County Sheriff deputies were most cooperative. In addition to law enforcement, many civilians went through crowd control training.
Trying to accommodate the needs of vendors means being able to supply water and electricity to those who need those resources. Some needed space for their tents, and others just needed to be able to get into their spot to park a food or merchandise truck.
What I am trying to demonstrate is the massive number of moving parts that must be coordinated to pull off a festival like the one we hosted May 2-3. I heard someone compare the festival to a machine with 1,000 moving parts.
That illustration does not capture the real situation. Many more than 1,000 people – not machine parts – were involved. While machine parts must obey the laws of physics and chemistry, people are not mindless cogs. Herding thousands of cats may be a better illustration.
Hundreds were involved in the festival as vendors, workers, members of the cook team, and a host of other tasks. Then we must factor in the tens of thousands who attended the festival.
Before I started my part-time job at the Visitor Center, I had no insight into just how much planning went into the festival. This year marks the third time I have had a spectator’s seat. I won’t even pretend that I was ring side. I was more in the nose-bleed section.
I can testify firsthand about the activity at the Visitor Center on May 3. We had around 400 barbecue sandwiches on hand for sale. I am not sure how many pints of barbecue we had at the center. I just know that when we stopped selling around 2:30 p.m., all the sandwiches and pints were gone.
I am sure you have heard that the BBQ Fest on the Neuse now holds a Guinness World Record for the number of barbecue sandwiches sold in eight hours. The previous record was 2,500. On Saturday, 4,775 – nearly double the previous record – were sold by the time we had to stop to count our sales. I am pretty sure that record is going to stand for a while.
The festival committee deserves a break and some rest. Before you know it, they will begin planning the 2026 edition of BBQ Fest on the Neuse. Their aim is always to make the event bigger and better.
Topping this year’s festival will be hard, but I am grateful to all who give of their time, talents, expertise, and energy to make BBQ Festival on the Neuse one of the premiere events in North Carolina.
Mike Parker is a columnist for the Neuse News. You can reach him at mparker16@gmail.com.
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