PASCO, Wash.-- The 20th annual Sportsmen Show took over the TRAC in Pasco this weekend. The event continues to be one of the most popular shows in the area and brings in lots of business.
If you love the great outdoors, the Sportsmen Show was the place to be this weekend. Nearly 10,000 people came to the TRAC in Pasco for the show this year. That's the biggest crowd for the show's three stops in the state and one of the largest events for the TRAC all year.
"It's the area and the crowds are just superb. They come early in the morning at ten o'clock and they stay till 5 or 6 o'clock in the evening. There's always somebody coming by to our booth," said Mike Carolus, a vendor from High Country Hunting.
Carolus keeps coming back to the show because he knows it's good business. It's the best he sees from the seven shows he goes to a year.
"We've been full vendor-wise a month. We get a waiting list of people that want to get into this show," said Merle Shuyler, show producer.
And it's not just vendors selling products that come to the show, but many informational booths too that know their target audience will be there.
"Our main goal is to provide people with where they can go fishing and hunting and answer the questions pertaining to laws and what they can and cannot do," said Rob McQuary, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The show became a more of a community event over the years with familiar faces happy to keep coming back.
"A lot of the same faces year after year and this is our 20th year so there's kids that were in diapers years ago, are now young adults and they bring in their own kids to the show now," Shuyler said.
"This is our 10th year and we'll be back again," Carolus said.
Shuyler said 30% of the vendors at the Sportsmen Show come from out of town and across the Northwest for the show. They know they can count on the crowds at this event each year.
