With less than two short weeks before the opening of the Carolina Classic Fair on Oct. 3. Tarus Clark is scrambling.
An entrepreneur with various business interests — operating a car lot and selling food at the fair among them — Clark counts on sales during the 10-day run of the Carolina Classic.
“We serve the happiest chicken on earth,” he says of his chicken-on-a-stick venture. “We’ve been doing it since back when it was the Dixie Classic Fair.”
But — and there’s always a ‘but’ — Clark has run into a tangle of issues related to how big a bite the city takes out of the bottom line and the placement of his booth.
As things stand, Clark has been consigned to what he considers a bad location following a dispute over financial reporting.
A prime spot means more foot traffic, which means more eyeballs, which adds up to increased sales. This, in turn, can make the difference between red and black on the balance sheet.
“We’re almost out of time here,” Clark said.
Simmering dispute
The ideal place to start is at the beginning.
And for Clark, that would be 12 or so years ago when he started selling chicken on a stick under his now familiar green-and-gold tent. Jamaican jerk or spicy barbecue, “If you’ve had our food at the fair, you know it’s good,” Clark said.
Things went well for most of that time. Because he was a regular who applied early, he’d wind up with a prime spot he considered his. “I built it up,” Clark said. “People know where to find us.”
Trouble started at the end of the 2023 fair.
He said vendors agree to pay a $3,000 fee to secure a spot and submit daily receipts. The fair takes 18% of gross sales until that $3,000 is zeroed out. After that, Clark said, the fair keeps collecting that 18%.
Pretty straightforward, right?
The problem first began toward the end of ‘23. Fair officials said he didn’t pay the 18% on the last day. Clark said he did, but an official refused to take his payment because he submitted a handwritten receipt.
“My cash register went out,” he said. “But they accepted (handwritten) receipts from another vendor who didn’t have a cash register. … vendors that didn’t look like me.”
When Clark applied for his spot in 2024, he was rejected because “they said I wasn’t honest about how much money we made.”
He sat out 2024 and reapplied this year. The application went through, but Clark said he was assigned a spot away from the action. Even worse, per Clark, is that the fair gave his place to an out-of-towner who sells the same thing.
“I have shed blood, sweat and tears for that spot. Literally,” he said. “And ya’ll going to take that spot and thumb your nose at me by putting us back near the barn?”
A huge deal
In a city with a $724.7 million annual budget and massive projects such as a sprawling mixed-use development near Wake Forest and a downtown amphitheater, one man’s trouble with the fair seems like small (deep-fried) potatoes.
But if you’re trying to hustle for a living and fight City Hall at the same time, it is a huge deal. It’s frightening.
The Carolina Classic Fair doesn’t need Tarus Clark as much as he needs it.
So, he pleaded his case via YouTube video, called elected officials, reached out to City Manager Pat Pate and used his allotted 3 minutes during the public-comment period of Tuesday night’s Council meeting to see if anything could change.
Council member Scott Andree-Bowen, who represents the district where Clark votes, conversed with him. At this point, the back-and-forth amounts to a he-said, he-said, and so Andree-Bowen indicated that the way things are now might be best for this year.
“I want him to do well, I want (the city) to do well and everyone else involved, too,” Bowen said.
Pate, with everything else on his plate, said that fair officials have been, well, fair.
“It’s not the biggest issue in the city, no,” Pate said. “But I understand that to individuals (involved) it is.
“I’ll say this. The fair director is working hard for all the vendors and listening to their concerns. We have policies in place, and if someone doesn’t comply with them, there are consequences.”
So, yeah, it is small potatoes against a $724.7 million annual budget. But it’s an entire meal for a little guy out to fight City Hall.
Scott Sexton has been a bemused observer of daily life — and occasional thorn in the side of elected officials — in Winston-Salem since 2005. ssexton@wsjournal.com
336-727-7481
@scottsextonwsj
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