South Carolina State Fair — Attraction in Columbia

Was a pretty fun day. There are lots of issues that will keep me from future visits.

Upon entry, the ride ticket booth experienced connection issues with credit hardware. We waited in line for like 30mins only to be told once we got to the both they were excepting cash only. Like what? You can not put signs out where the line begins rather than informing people after a 40 min wait that they must go to an ATM and get cash, then get back into the line to get ride tickets. That's screwed up, period. What an hour waste of time. Have an employee go through the line informing people that connections are down so they can get someone to go to ATM while another holds their place in line. Something.

After getting back in line and waiting another 30mins, I approached the booth again. With cash this time, the two working the booth were absolutely rude. Asking what the prices are, the lady proceeded to smack the window where the flyers were explaining the pricing. First. I'm older and can not see the writing well. Second, why can you not just say the prices? Smacking a window and looking at me like hurry up is terrible customer service and starts a visitors experience out as awful. Mind you, this is after having to go get cash and waiting again.

After this terrible experience and $120 (ride all you want tickets) purchased for myself, my wife, and my 8 year 6 were ready to go have some fun.

The rides were great. The vendors were expensive, like way too high in pricing. However, they were all great and the food was good. The only other issue we had was the lines for the rides. They were long. They usually went at a decent pace, but they were long, and they were made worse by attendees who paid an extra $20 for express riding. Meaning they could skip the lines and be seated first. This made everyone else have to wait that much longer. Every ride would fill half the seats with these express riders, and others would have to wait longer to get to experience the ride. I realize if you pay more, you get more, but this seemed like a bad idea, as people who paid good money just to ride the rides lost a good part of their return standing for other privileged individuals.

The State Fair should be fair. Stopping this extra pay for the extra dollars, making it more of a corporate event rather than a public event. Sad to see what profits have done to society and to see firsthand how it affects everyone's mindset.

While it was fun and my child enjoyed it. I will not be returning for future State Fairs. There are better things I can spend my money on for my family that will result in better returns and...

The fair always reminds me summer is gone and the cold weather is coming. I go to the fair for one thing...FOOD!!! This year I was disappointed, the only thing I can say was good was the ice cream. My corn dog was not what fair corn dogs usually are, I tried roasted corn on the cob(was my 1st and last time) it was dry and had no flavor at all. How someone can mess up french fries is a mystery to me but they sure weren't worth $8 even with the vinegar and salt. Prices were of course outrageous and every year get more expensive but it's the fair and not gonna stop because of my rant. I love the atmosphere, the lights, music and even the man trying to guess my age and weight, all the people in line to ride the Himalaya and even my toes getting run over by strollers full of babies and stuffed animals. I love walking thru the buildings and seeing artwork and one of a kind sand designs. No matter if the food wasn't as good as I remember last year or if it cost me $100 to go, I'll still be back next year because it still makes me think of being a kid and how exciting and fun the fair is. There's something about trying to win a huge stuffed animal that you can barely fit in your car and definitely have no place at home for!

2022 State Fair Busy, busy., busy! I see everyone is glad the fair is back after Rona shut her down the last few years. Food was good, expensive of course but its once a year so I wont moan about it too much. This year the attire was the most interesting. What's with all the crop tops and big bellies? I just dont understand why young ladies feel the need to make themselves look like they are trying to squeeze in a toddler top! I get the whole self expression but the only thing that is expressing is you dont have 1 or 2 thing...1-a real good friend or 2-a mirror. Because if they had either one they wouldn't have come out of the house looking like that. And the men this year in short shorts, why? But the weather was beautiful, lots of kids laughing and some not so happy. But as always I enjoyed myself and look forward to what new they can fry...

This was our first time visiting the State Fair, we were excited to get this opportunity. Got to the gate only to find out that I could not bring in my purse or most other sorts of bags. Some sort of South Carolina state law. I was pretty upset as there were things that I needed to bring in with me and didn't have any of the approved bags with me. So that caused quite a problem right off the bat.

Anyway, the grounds are very large, so much to see so much to do. We don't do rides so that wasn't of interest to us although the double level Carousel was absolutely amazing to see and watch. We enjoyed just walking and taking everything in. We went on what was supposed to be Blue Grass music day and was looking forward to it. But we were pretty disappointed as there wasn't much of that at all. We enjoyed the petting zoo, lots of beautiful animals.

We enjoyed wandering through some of the buildings with the farming displays, Christmas tree Farm displays and of course lots of vendors selling their items. Met some nice people.

We mostly went to enjoy the food. And there was plenty of that pretty much everything you could ask for and the vendors were in abundance. And although the food was enjoyable, what we didn't enjoy was the pricing. Now we get it that this is 2023 in the price of everything is gone up exponentially in recent years but quite honestly we were shocked at what these vendors were charging for their food. Quite honestly, it was ridiculous......bordered on gouging. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. We only had to feed two of us but I can't even imagine what the families went through this year if they went with several children or grands. It's inconceivable to me what it must have cost them between parking and admission and rides and then some food. Actually we know what wholesale products costs to produce the kind of food that they were selling and they were totally out of line. I doubt we will go back next year. With the kind of money that we spent, I can think of much nicer things to do for...