For the past 35 years, the root beer barrel has been as ubiquitous at local fairs and festivals as food on a stick. Bob Crocker inherited the business from his father, who started Crocker Root Beer Barrels at the Minnesota State Fair in 1969, and brought the barrels to the Big Gig in 1973.
Crocker owns 14 barrels, one of which is much larger than the others and serves root beer floats. The big barrel is located at the mid-gate on the Summerfest grounds.
At Summerfest, the barrels serve Pepsi products -- which means Mug root beer -- and at State Fair they dispense Coke, which distributes Barq's root beer. Surprisingly, root beer is only a portion of sales, and cola, pink lemonade and water often outsell the sassafras.
"I've always liked A&W root beer the best," says Crocker, laughing.
Most of the barrels are permanently placed on the Summerfest grounds, but Crocker says they are relatively easy to transport on a trailer bed and he occasionally moves them to other locales.
The cost of a soda is $2.50 for a 16 ounces; $4 for 32 ounces and $5 for 44 ounces. Ice water is $1. The prices remained the same for three years.
Crocker says the barrel's beauty floats in the fact people can grab a soda without waiting in a long food line.
"It's a simple concept," he says.
Crocker says his best year was in 1988, simply because the weather was very good for almost the entire 11-day run of Summerfest. "Good weather means good sales," he says.
In 1973, Tom Barbarian -- the man in charge of Summerfest's food and beverage at the time -- approached Crocker's father at the Minnesota State Fair and invited him to sell at Summerfest. Crocker had never heard of the Big Gig, but decided to try it because, coincidentally, he had recently agreed to sell at the Wisconsin State Fair.
On the first day of Summerfest in '73, Crocker's mother and her friend worked in the the barrel and made only $235. Even back then, it was a disappointing amount of money.
"My dad was pretty upset about it and almost wrote off Summerfest as a waste of money," says Crocker.
However, that night, the root beer barrel was on local TV news, and the next day, the lines were 25-people long.
"My dad realized that my mom and her friend couldn't work like that for the rest of Summerfest, so he hired a few people," says Crocker.
Today, Crocker hires 43 local people every summer to work in the barrels. One of his employees has worked for him 18 seasons. Another is a school teacher who has worked in the barrel for 14 summers, and Crocker recently hired the kid of another employee, starting a second-generation of soda slingers.
Clarissa Ramos, a legal assistant and college student, worked in the root beer barrels for eight years and she was kind enough to show me the ropes.
Her barrel is located next to Cedar Crest Ice Cream and she says there are pros and cons to working this particular barrel. Because of the barrel's placement, only one of the two windows is open for business, which makes her job a little easier. However, her barrel is known as "the stinky barrel" because of its closeness to the porta-potties.
Personally, I couldn't decide if the small space felt cozy or made me feel claustrophobic. It definitely brought back memories of my first job working inside a Koepsell's Popcorn Wagon at Summerfest. I also worked in a movie theater for many years, so I was no stranger to soda dispensing.
"This is a fun, low-stress job," says Ramos. "And you can drink all the free soda you want." (I drank two diet Pepsis during my shift.)
The smaller you are, the easier it is to work in a root beer barrel. I am 5 feet 8 inches tall, so I felt a bit Hulkish inside the barrel, but I quickly adapted.
Ramos says she deals with a fair share of drunks, and the worst was a guy who shook her barrel so hard all of the cups fell off the walls. She is also a pro at identifying people who sneak in their own booze and buy a soda to use as a mixer.
"They always order a large, with plenty of ice, but don't want the soda filled all the way to the top," she says. "And they always ask for a straw to use as a stir stick."
During my brief stint as a soda server, it was apparent that ice is the real star of the show. There is someone who comes around regularly to check up on the ice supply, which takes up most of the space in the barrel. Plus, customers are very particular about ice. Some don't want a single cube whereas others complain if there's too much.
"People get funny about their ice," says Ramos.
Molly Snyder started writing and publishing her work at the age 10, when her community newspaper printed her poem, "The Unicorn.” Since then, she's expanded beyond the subject of mythical creatures and written in many different mediums but, nearest and dearest to her heart, thousands of articles for OnMilwaukee.
Molly is a regular contributor to FOX6 News and numerous radio stations as well as the co-host of "Dandelions: A Podcast For Women.” She's received five Milwaukee Press Club Awards, served as the Pfister Narrator and is the Wisconsin State Fair’s Celebrity Cream Puff Eating Champion of 2019.
