Overview The Rockingham County Fair is a six-day agricultural fair each August on the Valley Pike just south of Harrisonburg, Virginia, and the International Association of Fairs and Expositions has given it first place for its competitive agricultural exhibitor program for about 20 years. The week puts livestock shows and youth exhibits beside civic-club food booths and a run of concerts and motorsports at the Pepsi Grandstand. The Rockingham County Fair Association, a not-for-profit founded in 1949, runs it. On site The fairgrounds sit on Route 11, the Valley Pike. The Pepsi Grandstand has bleacher seating for nearly 4,000 and carries the ticketed nights: concerts, and on the fair's own list, a tractor pull, a rodeo and a demolition derby. Around it are the livestock barns and show rings, an exhibit hall, the civic-club food booths and rows of outside vendors in 16-by-20-foot spaces. The Hoop Barn keeps its banners up all year, and fair week also carries a scholarship pageant with its own program book. RV camping is available on the grounds. Audience Much of the fair is the county showing itself: youth exhibitors bring their own animals and projects to the barns, and the food booths are run by local groups, among them an FCCLA chapter and volunteer firefighters. Talent and Influencers Brantley Gilbert and Luke Combs played in 2017, Morgan Wallen and Scotty McCreery in 2019, and Tracy Lawrence and Jimmie Allen in 2021. Dustin Lynch and Zach Williams came in 2022; Randy Houser, BlackHawk, Jimmy Fortune and The Isaacs in 2023; and Dylan Scott, Tyler Farr and Mac Powell in 2024. Track record The association's first fair, in 1949 at Linville-Edom High School, drew 5,000 people and cleared about $130. It bought 22 acres on Kratzer Road in 1953, stretched the fair to six days in 1964, and in 1979 sold that property for $1.5 million and moved to its present grounds. The 2017 fair drew 82,934. A county fair in Rockingham is on record as early as 1891. Brand presence Sponsors come in seven levels, from Bronze to Triple Diamond, and the top three choose which grandstand concert carries their name in order: first pick, second pick, then assigned. A grandstand sponsor hangs its own banners at the show, is recognized from the stage before the opening and main acts, and is named in the concert's radio promotion. Platinum and above add a banner at the Route 11 entrance, another in the Hoop Barn for the year and outside vendor space during fair week, and 30 percent of any sponsorship can be taken as fair tickets.