Blueberry Festival a complete success

Click to watch video - report by Donna McCollum, KTRE.

The 20th annual Texas Blueberry Festival is being called today a complete success. It surpassed all records thanks to locals and out of towners. About 17,600 people filled the streets for blueberry pancakes, to buy items sold by the 160 vendors, and to listen and attend a variety of entertainment. That's about 1600 more people from last year. They came from far and near. "About 45% of the people were from over a hundred miles away," said Bruce partain, chamber director. Survey cards were handed out randomly. Chamber people have their way of calculating how many are in attendance and how far they traveled. "Most of those it seems like in about the 200 mile range. Nobody about the 100 mile, everybody 200 plus and a few we had about 1500 hundred miles away. Probably relatives," said Partain. One couple left their hometown of Plano at 4:30 in the morning in order to make the festival.

The chamber even has calculations on how many blueberries were purchased. Mill creek farms sold 17,000 pounds of berries. They met their promise not to run out which was the case last year. This year they brought 20,000 pounds of berries packed in 5 pound boxes. Each box was sold for $10.

Partain said the festival could easily go until midnight, but it's purposely shut down at 4pm. "that allows some of the tourist revenue to be spread around. Visitors eat dinner in our restaurants, stay in our hotels and visit other shops and sights in town."