On the verge of turning 40, Folklorama has sucked in its gut and entered into an arduous self-improvement project: Setting professional standards for all of its pavilions.
The immensely popular summer event, which bills itself as the largest multicultural festival in the world, has grown weary of its "grey-haired, blue-collar" image, in the words of its director.
While the crowds remain impressive -- Folklorama counted 459,000 visits from an estimated 80,000 different festival-goers in 2007 -- and audience-satisfaction surveys yield encouraging results, there remain wild differences between the quality of entertainment, food, beverages and cultural displays on offer at the festival's 44 pavilions.
Instead of burying its head in the sand, the festival has embarked on a diplomatically delicate, five-year plan to set minimum standards for the likes of staging, sound and lighting and menu variety. Pavilions may also be asked to round up a minimum number of volunteers, maximum wait times for lineups could be implemented and entertainers may be able to compete in a Canadian Idol-style talent competition, with festival-goers voting for the eventual winner.
The overall goal is to improve the quality of the festival-going experience without dampening the ethno-cultural diversity that makes the festival a draw in the first place, said Ron Gauthier, executive director of the Folk Arts Council of Winnipeg, the non-profit organization that runs Folklorama.
And the task will be tough, considering every pavilion is an independent entity that effectively runs as a franchise -- not a branch plant.
"There really is no official part of the festival. We're the organizing body, but we don't sanction the entertainment or set the menus or tell pavilions what kind of drinks to serve," Gauthier said in an interview. "That's one of the benefits of the festival, but it's also one of the challenges."
Working with consultants, Folklorama will spend the next five years developing sets of standards and bouncing them off pavilions before putting them in place.
The festival will start small in 2009 with cultural displays, which some pavilions take very seriously but others devote few resources toward. New standards for more complex amenities -- namely food, beverages, entertainment and staging -- could be phased in by 2012, Gauthier said.
Folklorama, which is avowedly apolitical, actually began tinkering with its formula last year, when it dropped a long-standing stipulation pavilions avoid any references to wars or conflicts in their historical displays. Pavilions are now allowed to present objective facts -- for example, a nation gained independence in a given year -- provided they do not cast aspersions on any other ethnocultural group.
"We want pavilions to share their history, but not make judgments," Gauthier said. "Young people who come to Folklorama want to know something about the cultures they're experiencing."
Contrary to popular belief, Folklorama's audience is not entirely comprised of seniors on bus tours. While almost a third of the festival audience is over the age of 55, another third is below 35, according to a survey of paying customers conducted last year.
Roughly eight out of 10 festival-goers are Winnipeggers, more than 75 per cent have a college or university education and the overall satisfaction level of the average pavilion visit is well above 80 per cent, the survey suggests.
The organization has an annual budget of approximately $2 million and generates 81 per cent of that revenue itself, mostly through admissions, bus tours and a booking agency.
The 39th Folklorama runs from Aug. 3 to 16 with 44 pavilions. Returning this year are Israel, China and Paraguay, while a new organization is running a revamped First Nations pavilion.
bartley.kives@freepress.mb.ca
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