The Tourismus und Congress Frankfurt GmbH (TCF) has never been able to take stock of an autumn dip measurement as precisely as this year: 186,437 visitors were on the festival area at the ice rink on the 15 days of the event until Sunday.

The light barrier counts required to monitor the number of visitors, which are limited to 5,000 a day, enabled the exact measurement to be made.

Daniel Meuren

Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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“This is a huge success that nobody could count on,” say TCF managing directors Thomas Feda and Thomas Roie, chairman of the Frankfurt / Rhein-Main showmen's association, looking back on the first folk festival in the region after almost two years.

The Dippemess', which this year had five more opening days than usual, had always calculated with 250,000 visitors in previous years, but in view of the pandemic and the renouncement of the closing fireworks, among other things, satisfaction prevailed.

"This is very good for many of us who have had almost no income for a year and a half," says Roie.

“Not just financially.

Above all, we felt that people want folk festivals even after Corona, and we have a perspective again. "

Take Frankfurt as an example

Accordingly, after the cancellations in the previous year, the showmen are now hoping for Christmas markets. In Frankfurt, the TCF wants to deal with the state's new regulations by the end of September and then work out a concept. “We are looking for solutions,” says Feda managing director. “But an inner-city Christmas market is of course different from a folk festival on a festival site. You cannot fence a city center. "

Showman spokesman Roie, however, is confident - at least as far as Frankfurt is concerned. “We feel that we are in good hands here because we are looking for opportunities. Other municipalities such as Gelnhausen, Bad Nauheim or Hochheim, which have canceled their parties again, should take an example. ”As proof of safety, Roie can refer to the test results during the Dippemess'. There was no corona case among the good ten percent of employees who would have had to be tested daily for lack of a complete vaccination.