Where did they come from ?
At the Skien - Telemark booth at Norsk Høstfest in Minot, ND we supplied our visitors with brochures and maps from Telemark and from Norway. And we gave answers to hundreds of question about Telemark and about Norway. But we too had questions, did our visitors have roots in Norway, and what did they know about their anchestors. Altogether 324 visitors left their names and addresses at our booth in connection with our free lottery and competitions.
Where did the visitors to our Skien - Telemark booth at Norsk Høstfest come from ? Not surprisingly 36 % came from North Dakota. More than 16 % came from Minnesota, and 8 % from Wisconsin. 5 % came all the way from Washington State, nearly 6 % came from South Dakota, and nearly 4 % from Montana. And we had a lot of visitors from Canada, more that 6 % came from the province of Saskatchewan, 6,5 % came from Alberta, and more than 3 % came all the way from British Columbia on the west coast. We also had Canadian visitors from Manitoba and Ontario. And we had visitors from Arizona, from California, from Colorado, Georgia, Nevada, Idaho, Indiana, Ohio, New York, New England, Illinois, Wyoming, Iowa and from Oregon.
Why do more than 60.000 people come to Norsk Høstfest every year ? What make them decide to be Høstfest-goers ? 23 % say they come because of the music, they want to see the entertainers live. As many as 62 % say that they come because of the food. That means that that Scandinavian food has a huge market at least in the Mid West. 7 % come because they want to do some shopping. They want some Norwegian stuff, either for themselves or to give away to family and friends. 8 % of the Høstfest-goers come for other reasons than music, food and shopping. We would think that these 8 % include people like us from Telemark, we love to go to the Høstfest because we meet so many great and friendly people, and some of us also meet many relatives and good, old friends.