MnDOT bows out of State Fair

06/20/2007

The department plans to use the $48,000 in savings on an ad campaign.


By Mark Brunswick,
Star Tribune
Last update: June 20, 2007


The Minnesota Department of Transportation has announced that it will not have a presence at the 2007 Minnesota State Fair, citing what it sees as a limited return on its $48,000 investment. MnDOT said it will instead use the money to better market its programs to targeted groups through ads on the radio and the Internet.

At its exhibit last year, MnDOT recorded 42,000 visitors, less than 3 percent of the total state fair attendance.

"From a communications perspective, we want to devote our resources to radio ads and to the Internet to the potential of reaching millions with our messages," said MnDOT Communications Director Lucy Kender, who made the decision to end the 27-year relationship with the fair.

The chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, however, said the decision is an example of how budget shortfalls and cost-cutting have left taxpayers wanting for basic services.

Sen. Steve Murphy, DFL-Red Wing, said fairgoers have come to depend on the booth for information on roads, construction projects and maps.

"Not every Minnesotan has access to the Internet," Murphy said. "MnDOT concentrating their communications efforts on blogs and iPods doesn't serve the general public. We all have the right to information regarding the state of our transportation system."

In years past, the MnDOT display has featured a snowplow as well as free state-highway maps and various placards about safety. At one time, state workers assisted children in coloring cutouts of planes, cars, and trains and constructing hand-held "MnDOT on a stick" fans, but the effort proved labor intensive, Kender said.

The transportation department spends most of its $48,000 fair budget on labor. The figure is small by most MnDOT standards -- it would construct about 16 feet of a four-lane urban highway -- but Kender said the dollars will be directed back to the department's communications efforts. MnDOT is about to start an advertising campaign on hard rock and sports radio channels directed toward 18- to 34-year-old men that will warn of the perils of travelling too fast in construction zones.

"These are the guys we have to get our message out to," she said.