The Show goes on: We go behind the scenes of the 167th Great Yorkshire Show

Everyone has their own must-do throughout the week. But, have you ever wondered just how it all happens?

With 8,500 livestock to be judged, more than a thousand stalls, 140,000 visitors throughout the week - the 250 acre showground at Harrogate bursts into life for one week in July.

However, getting the showground ready and in tip-top condition takes weeks of work and many months of planning.

Small teams of staff catalogue every single one of this year’s 13,500 competition entries, set out a thousand seating benches, paint 450 hurdles, order 75,000 bin liners and 8,000 toilet rolls, construct 1,132 sheep pens, and polish the brass bell rung each year to start the show.

You get the gist…

With just days to go, The Yorkshire Post popped behind the scenes with the charity behind the event, the Yorkshire Agricultural Society (YAS) as labels were being printed, gates painted (just the 500 litres of paint ordered this year), and champagne flutes polished in the President’s Lounge to catch a glimpse of just how one of the country’s biggest farming spectacles comes together.

Michelle Mackey – Show Coordinator organising trade stands, bookings and entertainment

Michelle Mackey’s first Great Yorkshire Show, back in 2004, may well have been a baptism of fire as she had only started the job two weeks earlier. Now she likens it to completing a jigsaw puzzle of the 250 acre showground.

Whether the stall is machinery, cheese, gin or pet accessories - Michelle and her team have worked out where it will go. The singers, bands and main ring entertainment, they have booked it.

The marquees, temporary toilets and PA systems - they have arranged those too.

Eighty per cent of the stalls and exhibitors return each year, but when it comes to booking new ones, there is a lot to think about.

Michelle said: “It depends what size space they want, what they sell. If they are Yorkshire products, even better, but we don’t want too many of one thing. You have to think about what is around it, is it different, does it fit well in that area?”

Throughout show season, Michelle and her team visit other events for ideas and potential new exhibitors. They spend Autumn and Winter issuing contracts and booking caterers, bands, marquee companies and the like.

Around three weeks before the show, ground and field markings are painted, larger marquees are put up, while trade stalls set up the week prior.

Bands and entertainment turn up on the day - all being well. It has been known for them to be late after getting stuck in show traffic.

As she prepares for her 23rd show, Michelle has come to expect the unexpected.

She explained: “Somebody might have booked a six by six metre space, then turn up with an artic. You can plan, contingency plan and after 20 years think you have come across everything, but each year the unexpected happens.

“My favourite part of the show is that first morning and seeing people coming in. You can feel something in the air with the hub of people and the noise - it is what it is meant to be.”

Amanda Stoddart-West – Livestock entries co-ordinator

This year’s Great Yorkshire Show will have 838 beef cattle entries, a record 3,264 sheep entered, 384 pigs, 179 dairy goats, 224 dairy cows, 1,846 horses, 581 pigeons, 503 entries across cheese and dairy classes, and 504 in hives and honey.

Making sure they are catalogued correctly is Amanda, and three colleagues, also booking 250 judges (who can’t have judged the same category last year or at another show this year), 350 stewards and 100 extra volunteers.

With the dairy class being the last to submit entries just last week, it means late nights for the team to process information.

“It is an annual challenge”, jokes Amanda.

She started at YAS in 2002 to help out for a few months - and never left.

Since then entries are mainly computerised but, the very nature of country shows being tradition, some exhibitors still prefer paper entries.

She said: “There are groups who don’t want to move to an online system or don’t have access to computers all the time. That is fine and if paper works for them, we will go with it.”

The biggest challenge, says Amanda, is the amount of people wanting to enter at the show - although it bodes well for the industry, she added.

“More and more exhibitors want to enter each year. It is challenging and there have to be limitations as we can’t just go to a thousand acre showground overnight so we just do our best to help everybody.

“It is really positive for the industry though that people want to come and support us.

“It is the same with volunteers each year, people take great pride in coming to be part of the show. Without the volunteers, it just wouldn’t happen.”

Roz Bardon - Facilities team looking after the fabric of the showground

In the last few weeks Roz and the facilities team have painted the gates at the entrance to the showground, painted hurdles used in show-jumping classes, and painted steps in the main grandstand.

Each year, the fences used in the Cock O’ The North, the grand finale of the equestrian calendar for the week, have to be re-painted with the correct year.

The team have also jetwashed seats in the main grandstand, put together sheep pens, cut back hedges and put information and direction signs up around the showground.

As we meet, Roz is polishing up a little known element to the GYS which dates back just shy of 70 years.

It is a brass bell rung at the start of each show. It was presented by Major R T Whitehead to commemorate the visit of HM The Queen at the hundredth Great Yorkshire Show back in 1957.

When Roz took a job with the facilities team after being made redundant in 2016, she didn’t want to go back to working in an office, and wanted variety.

She certainly got what she came for, she said.

“It is the variety and the team I am working with that keep me coming back each year.”

The seemingly never-ending jobs list for the facilities team is integral to making the show what it is.

“It sounds obvious but it has to look right when you come into the showground and things have got to work.”

If she does get chance to see any of the show herself, you will find her watching sheepdog trials or enjoying the craic with gamekeepers in the country sports arena.

A scout leader, having worked for the National Trust and Yorkshire Peat Partnership, as well as the Forest of Bowland, countryside causes are close to her heart.

Roz said: “For me, the education area is one of the most important parts of the show. The way to educate about the outdoors is through the youth. The country is not going in the right direction in terms of the countryside, so anything we can do on this is fabulous.”

Graham Thompson – Commercial director, Yorkshire Events Centre

Having the self-confessed ‘best seat in the house’, Graham will host dignitaries and special guests to the GYS, as well as YAS’ 12,500 members who, if they are attending the show, will be welcomed for refreshments throughout show week.

The Pavilions of Harrogate are used almost every day of the year for conferences, weddings, exhibitions and even sixth form proms and of course, the GYS.

On paper it is ‘just another event’, but there is undoubtedly the feeling it is the pinnacle of the calendar.

There are 14 function rooms in the Pavilions. Each one is used every day of show week for meetings of government organisations, ministerial visits, the NFU, or the handing out of awards.

Then there are Royal visits too. Graham met HRH The Queen in 2008 when she visited to mark the 150th show.

Glamorous guests aside, Graham and his staff have to make sure carpets are cleaned, bars are stocked, afternoon teas are made and be flexible.

He explained: “I don’t think people realise the size and scale of what goes on. We were asked one year if we could get a golf buggy to take someone to the car park because they hadn’t quite realised the scale of what they were going to be walking around. We did it. There are 30,000 people on site but you have to look after everybody the best you can.

“No matter how much planning you do, you have to adapt. After 20 years in the job, I have the experience to do it.

“The first morning of the show, the hustle and bustle and problem solving, knowing the show is live and going - that is what I enjoy the most.”