Food Fest Attendance Up!

Up 2.5%!

Did we mention it's in Milwaukee?

• Attendance at Milwaukee's Summerfest rose 2.5 percent this year, aided by a long stretch of rain-free weather.
  
  Summerfest is an 11-day lakefront music event that bills itself as the world's largest music festival. It wrapped up last Sunday.
  
  Milwaukee World Festival Inc. is the company that stages the event. It says this year's attendance was 856,000, up from about 835,000 last year.

Did we mention it's a "pay event"? Why does that matter?

• About 700,000 fewer people attended this year’s Taste of Chicago food festival on the city lakefront and city officials say it’s likely because the annual July 3 Grant Park fireworks were canceled.
  
  Last year 3.35 million people attended the festival and this year attendance was 2.65 million.

And that's for a FREE event.