Q&A with American Royal President, CEO Jackie McClaskey

Posted December 4, 2023

Q: How did the decision for American Royal’s new home in Wyandotte County come to be? Where there other locations in mind?

A: From the very first meeting I attended I knew this would be a big project. The whole point in looking for a new home was that there was not enough space in the West Bottoms to fulfill the type of facility that would allow the American Royal to reach its full potential in the future.

I was at the time on the American Royal board of directors and was involved in conversations about things we could do in the West Bottoms and part of a team that was exploring how you could expand the student agriculture innovation activity in that area for both sides of the state line until the decision was made to instead find a whole new home. When we got involved in the Kansas perspective, the focus was always on Wyandotte County for the aspect of keeping American Royal close to Kansas City. We did look at multiple sites in Kansas.

Q: How will this new campus breathe life into the Kansas workforce and will American Royal’s workforce evolve?

A: The employment impact is made up of three sides; direct, indirect, and induced. When you total all of these together its about 4,900 jobs that will be created on an average annual basis over the first year of operation. We have 22 full-time employees in addition to an operational staff that ranges from 6 to 12 individuals who work either full-time or part-time temporarily. When we move to the new campus, we plan to see that number double.

Q: The new campus is being constructed in phases. The main complex is first on the list, what is the outlook for the two sequential phases?

A: The main complex, while it’s being made in sequence, is all being built in one phase. There is a second phase that will result in a 120-acre festival grounds and that development is not included in our employment impact or economic impact. It will involve our current employees and will likely result in hiring full-time employees as well.

Q: The economic impact this new campus will have is projected to be over $500 million. How does this facility reach a number like that?

A: We estimate economic impact based on two things: the number of people expected to visit the site and the amount of money they are expected to spend. So, we used existing visit data and Kansas Department of Commerce data to estimate the expenditures of individuals who would come to the American Royal and we categorized them into three different groups. People that would just come for a partial day activity, people that would come for a full day or multiple day activities. We look at our system that counts all of our existing events going back to 2011, then we run current numbers. From there we tie in anticipated increases in both attendance and the number of new events that can be created for the new facility resulting in the number of actual daily attendees at the American Royal and multiply it by the expected expenditures to determine the overall economic impact of $500 million. How the greater Kansas City region functions and its economic impact will trickle out between multiple counties in both states.

Q: What other activities can we expect from this new campus?

A: For the main complex, we include both existing events but we also include additional food and agriculture, music and athletic events. That is not the majority of our event days but we do on average 16 – 20 concerts or athletic events in a given year that are a part of the economic impact. What is not included is festive grounds and we expect significant opportunities for music and entertainment events that we could host on just a main complex alone.

Q: Entertainment is one thing, but education is another staple of the American Royal. What can we expect from the new learning and engagement center?

A: The American Royal has always been involved in agricultural education regarding its physical nature. Outside of activities where we might have kids come on a field trip and get to see the youth rodeo or the livestock show, the facility has been limited to the small museum that we have now. The new space will allow us to do much more engaging ways of education. It is an 80,000-square-foot facility being designed to be high-tech and innovative.

Q: What is your favorite addition to American Royal’s new home?

A: The auditorium in the learning and engagement center. It is going to be a very versatile space that will also have immersive education from a TED Talk speaker one day to a livestock auction on the next, the stage is the epitome of what to accomplish through education and creativity.