National Cherry Festival
TRAVERSE CITY -- Peter Garthe set an ambitious goal for the number of Cherry Festival Commemorative pins he wants to sell this year. But that's not unusual; he does so every year.
And Garthe would like to see one of his pin-buyers be the winner of the raffle drawing. But he's done that, too -- four times.
This year he not only wants to sell the winning pin, but to sell it to a woman.
"I have four men winners, but now I want a woman winner," Garthe said.
Garthe is an institution of the National Cherry Festival, earning his notoriety for selling the most commemorative pins each year for the last 15 years, a total of 160,144. His sales alone pumped $308,491 to Cherry Festival coffers.
He has seen the price of pins go from $1 when he started in 1991 and sold 600 pins to the $5 price instituted last year, when he sold 7,350. But nothing -- pin price, bad weather, a robbery attempt -- seems to keep him from the top sales spot each year since 1993.
As with most champions, Garthe's first pin win has special meaning.
In 1993, Garthe earned two American Airlines tickets to anywhere in the continental United States for selling the most pins, 7,835. He gave the tickets to his parents, who celebrated their 50th anniversary the year before.
The present was a little late, but he was glad his parents had the opportunity to travel to San Francisco on him. The Festival board now awards a $500 prize for anyone who sells the most pins.
The pins, sold every year by a number of individuals and groups, come in two varieties, silver and gold. Anyone lucky enough to purchase a gold pin gets his or her name entered in a drawing for the grand prize, which this year is a Toyota Tundra and Crownline boat.
Second prize is a seven-night Royal Caribbean Cruise for Two from Passageways Travel. Silver pin names go into a second chance drawing for a 47" Phillips LCD TV & Sony Home Theater System.
This year, Garthe is a little concerned because the pins' purpose has changed. In years past, festival-goers had to purchase a pin to get into concerts or other special attractions. This year, they must purchase a $10 ticket for such events and the pin purchase is good for the raffle only. This change somewhat cuts into Garthe's strategy.
"I sold pins a lot at the beer tent. That was a good spot, but now they've changed it," Garthe said.
He capitalized on that hot spot by placing himself in front of the worker checking IDs, so people would buy the pin, which they needed to get into the tent, and then have their IDs checked.
The Traverse City native isn't too concerned about losing his title, though.
"It might hurt sales a little bit, but not too much. I've sold a lot of pins over the years and some people just buy them. I know a lot of people, so they buy pins from me," he said.
His goal this year is 7,361, but he calls this a "long-shot." He will be happy with 7,000. Since the Fourth of July was on Friday this year, he liked his chances.
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