Mission and History

MISSION STATEMENT (Adopted in 2021)

Waterfowl Festival, Inc. is dedicated to the promotion and enhancement of Chesapeake waterfowl and wildlife conservation; we promote community, education and awareness by celebrating Eastern Shore heritage, sporting traditions, and artistic expression.

The Mission & History of the Waterfowl Festival

Festival History

Around 1970, a group of Eastern Shore sportsmen and women conceived an event that would ultimately grow into a regional tradition spanning generations – the Waterfowl Festival. Relatively isolated for centuries, the Eastern Shore opened to the rest of the state with the construction of the first Chesapeake Bay Bridge in 1952. Development quickly followed as people fell in love with the area. Concerned by the rapid growth, the festival founders envisioned an event that would share with visitors the unique Eastern Shore heritage that they treasured, in the hopes of educating others how to live and work here while preserving its open spaces. Their secondary objective was to  raise  funds to protect the wildlife and habitat that were integral to the area’s way of life. 

Enlisting numerous local individuals and organizations in their plans, they staged the first Waterfowl Festival in November, 1971, timing it to coincide with the opening of goose hunting season. Those early expectations were that the event would “grow into something extraordinary” and indeed it has. The festival grew to inspire other events across the nation, creating a movement that has sustained growth in the conservation space for decades.The Waterfowl Festival has grown from three small exhibits in downtown Easton to more than a dozen venues throughout the town, with an annual economic impact to the area of over 3 million. More than six million dollars have been raised for education and conservation and awarded to over fifty organizations, including an endowed scholarship for our student volunteers that has awarded over $200,000 to deserving high school and college students.

The Economic Impact of the Waterfowl Festival

• The festival also plays a key role in fostering economic activity in other Talbot County towns outside of Easton. In 2019, more than 41% of festival attendees participated in activities held in St. Michaels and Oxford. Of the visitors who stayed in Talbot County overnight, roughly one quarter stayed in either St. Michaels, Oxford or Tilghman Island.
• Efforts to be welcoming to visitors seem to be paying off- 68% of visitors in 2019 were returning for at least the third time and 99% of Waterfowl Festival visitors reported that they plan to visit Talbot County again.
• In 2019, the Waterfowl Festival attracted more than 15,120 attendees with 45% of those attendees visiting from more than 50 miles away. The average length of stay among visitors was 2.1 days with 41% visiting Easton for the day while the remaining 59% stayed overnight in the region.
• Excluding the cost of festival admissions, these visitors spent a total of nearly $3 million on various goods and services within Talbot County economy. On average, each visitor spent $145 on lodging (overnight only), $98 on food and beverages, $61 on recreation and entertainment and $138 on retail purchases.
• The Waterfowl Festival generated an additional $496,000 on event-related operating expenses by vendors, exhibitors and event organizers in the Talbot County economy. Adding this to visitor expenditure brought total local 2019 Waterfowl Expenditures to $3.5 million.
• This $3.5 million in expenditures resulted in nearly $2.5 million in total economic impact (value added) to the Talbot County economy. Talbot retained about 74 cents of every dollar spent locally by festival visitors and organizers. Approximately $905,000 of Waterfowl Festival spending left the region, “leaking” out through purchases of imported goods and services.
• Waterfowl Festival-initiated spending generated $787,000 in tax receipts, including $357,000 in federal receipts and another $429,000 in state and local tax receipts. The event contributed roughly
  $29,000 in hotel taxes and nearly $6,000 in state and local taxes & fees associated with car rentals.

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