Show families weigh up whether circuits are viable amid cost squeeze

Sideshow alley business owner Melissa Quay travels to Queensland from her home in Victoria each year with an entourage of balloons, prizes and games.

Usually Ms Quay would bring a caravan for the show circuit, but fuel costs and insurance premiums meant this year she had to leave it — and her daughter — behind.

"We've spent the last four weeks and probably the next four weeks living in a truck [instead] of living in a caravan to combat the cost."

From food trucks to carnival rides, sideshow alley is an annual drawcard for the hundreds of Australians in show business.

But a triple threat of high fuel, expensive insurance and staff shortages means many operators are having to make difficult decisions.

"We normally run out and do a few little shows, but now we're weighing up whether it's viable for us to do that."

Absorb insurance, fuel costs 'somehow'

In Ms Quay's family, the show circuit has been a multi-generational business.

Her "dad came out here before me" and "his dad came out here" before that, she said.

But the increased costs were worrying.

She said public liability insurance increased fivefold since 2020 and at one point she could not obtain any coverage at all.

"It went from being around $10,000 a year to $52,000 a year," she said.

The sideshow alley operator made staff cutbacks from three to two "just to limit our other expenses" and absorb the costs.

The Showmen's Guild of Australasia said show business had become "very challenging" particularly for those who racked up around 15,000 kilometres every year on remote circuits.

"The circuit that went from Darwin and back, right through the Northern Territory, was very challenging," president Aaron Pink said.

"There's not a lot of shows in that run … and it's a long way back [home]."

But Mr Pink said he was hopeful operators would still go to smaller shows, even if it became difficult to afford.

"A show movement out in western Queensland and western New South Wales is something young families really look forward to," he said.

Recruiting staff is 'hard'

Darrell Brown, who has been running a bust-a-balloon game, said he has been in the travelling show business his entire life.

"Staff's a hard thing, mate," Mr Brown said.

"Once upon a time, in the late '90s and that, people have been coming down looking for work all the time.

"Now you ask people if you want a job, '[They say] 'nahh, we don't want a job'."

Mr Brown said his children had graduated school and were helping "at the moment", but his brother who operates the "big machines" had struggled to find staff.

"There's only him and his wife, so he can't climb up and down the big Ferris wheel, and do all that.

"He needs some guys to help him."

Show must go on, says next gen

At a fishing stall, Chase Lovell, 9, demonstrated how to catch plastic ducks.

"There's $20 for seven ducks and then there's $10 for three," he explained.

"Depending on which duck you get, there's a number on the bottom and we count up the numbers to how many ducks you got.

"Whatever the numbers add up to, you get a prize."

Chase and his sister Peyton are seventh-generation show kids but enjoy their role in the family business.

"I like to follow all my family, and do everything my family does," Peyton Lovell said.

"You do have to put it up and put it down, but the most fun is to work it."

That enthusiasm has continued after high school for fifth-generation show person Jayden Fraser.

Mr Fraser, 20, said he has "had other jobs in the past" but preferred the travelling lifestyle of show business.

"I just love to travel, I love to drive around Australia," he said.

"It is getting harder for a lot of us [and] the fuel costs are bit how-you-going.

"I don't know what the future holds, but hopefully everything still works out and the shows still stick around."