By Carrie Muehling

DECATUR – The Farm Progress Show comes back to Illinois this year, and organizers have again expanded the show field.

When the current facility adjacent to Richland Community College in Decatur was built in 2005, there was room to expand it by 20 percent. In 2011, that area was full. In 2013, organizers added an annex outside of the show’s gates.

“When we finally sat down to do all of the mapping in April of this year, we ended up with a full exhibit field and about 125 companies on the wait list,” said Matt Jungmann, national events director with Penton Agriculture, which is the parent company for the Farm Progress Show. “So, the decision was made to make a permanent infrastructure upgrade. We’re adding about 400,000 square feet of exhibit space.”

The addition comes on the southwest corner of the show site, closer to the community college. It will completely replace the annex area that was outside of the show grounds in 2013. Jungmann said depending on the weather, the show can draw up to 160,000 visitors to Central Illinois over the three-day event. But he said it is the show’s exhibitors that bring a real economic impact to all of Central Illinois.

“With Decatur only having 1,300 hotel rooms, they’re only covering a third of the need. So the demand spills over into Springfield, McLean County and Champaign. They all see an impact. All those airports see an impact,” said Jungmann.

He said an expanded show will make a difference economically, too.

“We did a little bit of math, and by increasing the number of exhibitors at the show, it probably increases the economic impact by about one and a half to two million dollars from what we typically have of a $10 million impact to the whole Central Illinois region,” said Jungmann.

The Farm Progress Show returns to Decatur on Sept. 1-3, 2015.

Listen to the interview with Matt Jungmann here:

Carrie Muehling can be reached at [email protected].