We held the Make-A-Wish Corn Maze Challenge Sept. 11 &12. How do you measure the success of such an event? The weather severely cut attendance. While Sunday was great weather; Saturday was a rain out. But as we have seen before heavy rain on a Saturday affects Sundays attendance as well. While a few hundred came out Sunday; many admitted debating coming for fear of trudging through mud. After an all day rain Saturday there was not even one mud puddle anywhere along the maze paths; and people were shocked to find out how good the paths were. We had a fair amount of press on the event which is encouraging for next years event.
Sunday afternoon I was a little discouraged knowing how weather had ruined the events full potential. But; I am a farmer and one years bad luck on weather is just part of the game. There is a poem "I'm only a Farmer". "I know the sun better than anyone. And the soil. And the wind. And the rain. I am the man who works with them. And who sometimes fears them." Well Friday I was fearing the rain; Saturday & Sunday I saw the disappointing results of the rain come to reality.
But something else happened Sunday. I met Aileen. Aileen and her husband came out of the maze entrance after wandering around for a while and went to sit down at the picnic tables. They were not typical maze walkers. They each had a walking cane with them. They really didn't come to challenge the maze; but to support Make-A-Wish. Aileen had nothing but praise for the organization. Then it came out Make-A-Wish had granted a wish to their grand son Josiah when he was six. As she talked about the time they had with her grand son and Make-A-Wish her voice quivered some. She told me they lost Josiah at age 8. In those several minutes we talked; Josiah's grand mother erased any doubts I had about this event being a success. The weather nicked us this year. We know the event will get support of people and will do it again next year. Not only that we will see about coordinating mazes in other states the same weekend.
(Below info was written before the event was held)
Bestmaze will host the first annual Make-A-Wish Corn Maze Challenge Sept 11 & 12. This will become a yearly event the Sat. & Sun after Labor Day. The Maze Challenge will raise funds for the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Michigan - a nonprofit organization that grants wishes to children with life-threatening illness. About 340 children in Michigan each year have their wishes granted through Make-A-Wish. With our central location in southern Michigan and easy access 1 mile from exit 122 off of I-96 we think this should grow into a huge yearly event. Come this year; have fun; and start your tradition.. Tell your friends and coworkers to "get lost" Sept 11th &12th.
The event is open to everyone who has ever thought about conquering a giant corn maze. This maze is unique in design with several security towers overlooking the paths. No need to worry about being lost all day; just wave to a tower if you want them to give you hand signals through the difficult area.
We had looked at doing an annual fundraiser for a public serving organization; but with so many worthwhile organizations we did not know which one to support. While my son was waiting in line for a picture with Disney characters, a Disney cast member came up and told us they were going to be escorting a guest in ahead of him. We saw a family with a boy my sons age having his wish granted. Though the family was enduring a life threatening illness; they didn't seem to have a care in the world at the moment. My wife and I looked at our two healthy kids, and squeezed each others hand. Then and there we decided Make-A-Wish was going to be the organization we wanted to support with a maze challenge.
If you are new to Bestmaze look over the other content pages. This will be our 10th year of operation. Our customers told us to change our name to Best Maze years ago. After hearing this over and over...Bestmaze Corn Maze became our official name.