It’s been 30 years since the U.S. hosted a World’s Fair, and that last one – the 1984 shindig in New Orleans – had the sad distinction of being the only World’s Fair to go bankrupt while the event was underway. And while other major cities around the world have continued to host these international expositions – most notably Shanghai’s celebrated 2010 event plus next year’s Milan happening and a 2020 World’s Fair planned for Dubai – American cities have mostly ignored the notion of accommodating this type of event.
However, this past year has placed more than a little nostalgia on a distant era when the U.S. had no problems offering up World’s Fair attractions. Seventy-five years ago, the 1939 World’s Fair in New York offered an optimistic promise of a future filled with peace and industrial progress. Fifty years ago, New York hosted the spectacular (and somewhat controversial) 1964/65 World’s Fair. Spokane’s ecologically focused Expo 74 was recalled this year with a 40th anniversary commemoration. And even if the New Orleans event was a financial flop, many Big Easy residents talked up that exposition this year with great fondness.
From a commercial standpoint, the production of a World’s Fair has traditionally almost always a money-losing endeavor – but only if one focuses on ticket sales for the event. And considering that government money was funneled into many of the U.S.-based World’s Fairs in the past, it is hard to imagine today’s fiscal conservatives embracing this type of a project.
But from a long haul perspective, having a World’s Fair has often been the foundation for significant urban development projects that ultimately improve the quality of life in the host cities. Dr. Robert Rydell, history professor at Montana State University and author of World’s Fair-related books including World of Fairs: The Century-of-Progress Expositions and Fair America, argues that these expositions can generate the right type of returns.
“The answers depend on how money is invested,” he explains, “If an investor only invests in a fair expecting to make money off gate receipts, the investor is not very wise. If, however, an investor thinks more broadly about economic possibilities in both the short and long term, my sense is that money can be made. For example, the 1968 fair revitalized San Antonio and built a major convention center that is still in use. Ask anyone in San Antonio about the economic value of the Gonzalez Center and they will share with you their thoughts about its ‘value’ for the business/tourist climate there. And don’t imagine that all fairs necessarily lost money off gate receipts. Any American city remotely considering hosting a fair should meet with the organizers of the 2005 Nagoya Expo – it made money hand-over-fist off attendance that vastly exceeded projections.”
Today, several American venues are jockeying to get approval from the Bureau of International Exhibitions (BIE) to host a future World’s Fair. A group of business and political leaders are trying to position Minneapolis-St. Paul as the site of a 2023 World’s Fair, while a similar consortium is pushing for Houston to host an exposition in 2025. Other groups based out of San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego have also toyed with similar efforts. (Oddly, one location that is in desperate need of investment, Detroit, has not even considered this type of a financial shot-in-the-arm.)
But these pursuits are complicated because the U.S. is no longer a member of the BIE – and while a World’s Fair can proceed without BIE approval (the 1964/65 New York World’s Fair being the most notable example), having that group’s stamp of approval will help to bring more international participation and credibility to the event, particularly if it is based in a second-tier city rather than a major media and tourism hub.
Furthermore, this type of an event takes a great deal of planning that can take years to accomplish. For many commercial real estate leaders, time is not an ally. In an interview with the trade publication Finance and Commerce, Stefanie Meyer, a principal and senior vice president for Mid America Real Estate, was uncertain whether the organizers behind the proposed 2023 World’s Fair in Minneapolis-St. Paul would be able to find enough acreage to accommodate this future event if the current real estate market begins to heat up with greater intensity.
“Nine years from now – so much is going to happen between now and then,” Meyer said. “There are very few sites that are just going to sit and wait for that … Some of those land owners might not be able to just hold onto it. When the market is there, they have to react to it.”