Allgäu festival week

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Mood in the park tavern
Frequence's music performance during the festival week
Festival of lights
Late Saturday afternoon visitors
Crowds on a Saturday evening

The Allgäuer Festwoche ( FeWo for short ) in Kempten (Allgäu) is the largest business fair in the region, it is also one of the largest social events in the Allgäu and one of the ten largest German consumer fairs. There was a forerunner of the festival week in Kempten as early as 1923. With a few exceptions , the festival week has been held every year in August since 1949 . The event takes place in the center of the city. A special festival beer is brewed every year. This festival beer has been delivered by the Allgäu brewery in recent years , and in 2010 for the first time by the private brewery Zötler .

history

The first forerunner of the festival week took place in 1923. The Kempten trade association organized the Kempten trade, industrial and agricultural exhibition under the master painter and city councilor Ferdinand Geißler . The exhibition venues were, for example, the prince abbot's residence of the prince monastery of Kempten and the granary . Exhibitors were shoe and watchmakers , stoners , saddlers and also furniture and water turbine manufacturers. There were also conferences of the trade association, the carpenters' association and the dairy industry. The conception corresponded to today's festival week: There were stand concerts on the Burghalde , festival in the city ​​theater , a large air show with passenger flights and a large fireworks display at the end of the event.

After the Second World War , in 1949, the then incumbent Mayor Georg Volkhardt decided to give the economy a new impetus. Volkhardt was thinking of a show with the name Kempten Art and Skills . The culture week set up by his predecessor Anton Götz is still recognizable in Volkhardt's idea. The city council, which was filled with merchants, liked the idea and supported Volkhardt. Despite the meager budget, Volkhardt made an advance of 290,000 marks for the Allgäu festival week. His deputy, Albert Wehr , became the organization manager . He emphasized at the time: "As the largest city in the Allgäu, we wanted to set a good example."

At the first opening, Volkhardt and Wehr used the opportunity to be present from politics, society and business. The mayor drew attention to planned projects and led the guests of the first week of the festival past over 360 exhibitors. Around three quarters of the exhibitors come from the region.

In 1958 and 1968, on the occasion of the festival week, the state rooms of the residence were decorated with thousands of orchids, roses and carnations. In 1962 the courtyard garden with the orangery was converted into an open-air garden show with a festival of lights and a large tattoo. In 1976 the festival week suffered economic losses for the first time. In 1991 it even failed completely.

With the construction of the central transfer point ( ZUM for short ) in 1995 , the so-called Lyceum at the Stadtpark was no longer available. A new location had to be found for the wine tent, the exhibition management and various other service facilities. The festival week was already 50 years old, so the old concept was also out of date. The city administration undertook a restructuring under Mayor Ulrich Netzer . The wine tent was replaced by an arbor-like park tavern, and the milk tent was modernized with a cheese dairy and an internet connection. The exhibitions were also restructured: for example, the market hall on Königsplatz serves as a center for digital technology during the festival week.

For the 63rd Allgäu Festival Week in 2012, the concept was revised again: Instead of house and street names , the entrances were named after the cardinal points . The exhibition halls were completely or partially restructured. The organization of ticket sales has also been changed.

The festival week was canceled for 2020 due to the global COVID-19 pandemic .

concept

Events

The nine-day Allgäu Festival Week organized by the city of Kempten combines an experience fair for consumers with a folk festival in the open air and beer tents . Around 400 exhibitors from industry, trade, agriculture and services are represented in around 20 temporary exhibition halls at the Allgäu business exhibition. In addition to the business show, there are several special shows, adventure areas, theme days and a wide variety of accompanying events from the fields of art, culture , business, communication and sport. During the festival week, three specialist conferences have been held for many years, but these are only open to invited visitors: the Allgäu Tag (host Allgäu GmbH), the Allgäu Wood Day (host Holzforum Allgäu) and the Allgäu Energy Day (Energy and Environment Center Allgäu).

Visitor numbers

Visitor numbers from 2000 to 2014
year Day Eve total
2000 77.109 64,948 142.057
2001 89.914 69,212 159.126
2002 89,066 63,575 152.641
2003 74,710 71,045 145,755
2004 85,524 68.902 154.426
2005 94,310 72,694 167,709
2006 103,667 76,045 179.712
2007 97.226 74,139 171,365
2008 102.602 70,402 173.080
2009 100,494 69,666 170.160
2010 104,429 79,804 184,233
2011 101,077 83.507 184,584
2012 100,582 77,394 177.976
2013 104,495 79.165 183,660
2014 110.208 74,354 184,562

Since the first week of the festival in 1949, more than 100,000 people have attended the event. From 1970 the number of visitors hardly fell below 170,000. In 1988, 203,544 attended the nine-day event.

The Lord Mayor of Kempten Ulrich Netzer in the milk tent (2010)

terrain

The area of ​​the festival week extends in the city center around the city ​​park and partly also in it, as well as between Königsstraße and Linggstraße in the east, Salzstraße in the west, Residenzplatz in the north and Beethovenstraße in the south. Another area west of the Salzstrasse was accessible via a temporarily installed pedestrian bridge, bordered by Bodmanstrasse, Frühlingsstrasse and Eberhardstrasse. The pedestrian bridge was replaced by temporary pedestrian traffic lights in 2011. So that visitors to the event do not drive into the city by car, there is an opportunity to park and ride on the southern part of the Heussring of the Mittlerer Ring . A lane is converted into a parking lot and city buses run by the Kemptener Verkehrsbetriebe at regular intervals to bring visitors to the festival area.

However, there were always plans to take the festival week outside of the city center. When in 1976 the festival week became uneconomical and made losses, a discussion arose on the subject of location. A site survey was commissioned. The city administration was against outsourcing the festival week. In 1990 it was written in a published inner city concept that a relocation was necessary. A large number of traffic problems could be solvable here. Likewise, one wrote in this concept that there would be no great development opportunities without additional space. In 1991 the festival week was canceled due to the construction of the Königsplatz underground car park . In 1992 the friends of the old town in Kempten suggested setting up the festival week without fences and thus expanding it better. But the 50th edition was successful again in 1992.

Regional importance

The festival week is considered a common meeting point between politics, society and business. The home nurse Alfred Weitnauer received the honorary citizenship of his hometown on the occasion of the 25th Allgäu Festival Week . Bavaria's Prime Minister Franz Josef Strauss gave the opening speech twice. Edmund Stoiber has already opened the Allgäuer Festwoche four times and received the Golden Town Hall Medal when he participated for the first time . In 1994 the social housing model project integrated living was inaugurated on Brennergasse. Mayor August Fischer collected money for the expansion and renovation of the Kempten city theater at a raffle much earlier .

literature

  • Jenny Feil, City of Kempten (ed.): 40 years of the Allgäu Festival Week Kempten, Allgäu, Cambodunum. Streiflichter 1949–1988. Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten 1988.

Web links

Commons : Allgäuer Festwoche  - collection of images

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 192 .
  2. ^ A b Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 193 .
  3. ^ A b c Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 198 .
  4. ^ Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 200 .
  5. ↑ Number of visitors to the Allgäu Festival Week since 2000. (No longer available online.) Formerly in the original ; accessed on June 10, 2020 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.festwoche.com
  6. festwoche.com: Statistics ( Memento from May 17, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  7. ^ Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 199 .
  8. ^ Franz-Rasso Böck , Ralf Lienert , Joachim Weigel: JahrhundertBlicke auf Kempten 1900–2000 . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer - Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1999, ISBN 3-88881-035-3 , p. 194 .