Giant Pumpkins Coming to Spa State Park

I THINK IT WAS the fall of 2015 when Ned Chapman at Sunnyside Gardens first called me.

He said that he wanted to meet and talk with me about Giant Pumpkins and the chance to host a festival that Cooperstown had decided to cancel.

Fast forward to September of 2016, I am at Sunnyside Gardens watching as pumpkin growers from Saratoga County, New York State, and four other surrounding states start arriving in trucks.

Each truck is towing a trailer, and on each trailer is a giant pumpkin. They were bright orange, yellow, and green but they were all giant!

The crew of volunteers, including Todd Brownell and Wayne Seelow, had to use forklifts to move these giant pumpkins from the trailers into the staging area for our first-ever Saratoga Giant PumpkinFest. 

Surrounded by a rope fence, the staging area quickly resembled the tailgating section at a football game. The pumpkin growers, their families, and friends taking the best seats to watch as each giant pumpkin was weighed.

This first-time event had generated a couple of news stories earlier from local media outlets but nothing that would tip us off to the crowd that would show up that day.

Because we had never hosted such an event, we had no photos of the giant pumpkins and little knowledge of how many pumpkins might be brought to this competition. 

So the content available for us to do an effective digital ad campaign was limited. But the ads we created gained immediate and considerable attention. 

Within a matter of days, our online ads served via social media in partnership with Mannix Marketing had  reached tens of thousands of people with hundreds of likes and shares.

Now estimating crowds at a festival is not an exact science. But there is no doubt that this first year event attracted more than 5,000 people.

Last year for our 2nd annual Giant PumpkinFest, the weather was just as nice as the first year and we had a crowd estimated at more than 7,000 people, mostly families.

With attendance numbers like this, we’re moving this year’s 3rd Annual Giant PumpkinFest to the Saratoga Spa State Park, on Sunday, September 30.

Once again, Ned Chapman and Sunnyside Gardens, with the help of Todd Brownell and Wayne Seelow, the Saratoga Spa State Park and the Spa City Farmer’s Market, will organize and host this giant pumpkin competition. 

We’re all again hoping for great weather, lots of giant pumpkins, and a big crowd.

The Farmer’s Market will have lots of vendors on hand. We have sponsors like Stewart’s Shops who will be serving ice cream and Dizzy Chicken who will be serving chicken, mac n’ cheese, and pulled pork. Hoffman Car Wash will organize a “Corn Hole” tournament and Sunnyside Gardens will have Hayrides. There will be donuts, cider, apples and pumpkin treats and lots more. 

Attendance is free and there are plentiful opportunities to take a picture of your kids or a selfie of yourself with these giant pumpkins. 

For more details, visit www.saratogagiantpumpkinfest.com. 

And should you want to win your own 100 pound pumpkin, you can enter a free contest at www.ilovesaratoga.us where you will have to guess the weight of this year’s heaviest pumpkin. 

Let me assure you, it will be well above 100 pounds!