Courtesy St. Joe Frontier Casino
Dozens of people are signing up to see who will be top dog in a local hot dog eating contest.
“The hot dog eating contest is one of a kind and has never been done here,” said Tony Scudiero, St. Jo Frontier Casino General Manager. “We wanted to do a promotion that was similar to the national contest but on a little smaller scale.”
Scudiero is referring to the Nathan’s International Hod Dog Eating Contest held every 4th of July where thousands of people descend on Coney Island to try to eat the most hot dogs.
He said the casino decided not to hold their contest on Independence Day because of the number of activities already taking place around the casino with the annual fireworks display so they decided on July 18.
“We’re always looking for new things to find out what our customers of the people in this area like so we just thought what the heck let’s try a hot dog eating contest and if it works we’ll bring it back next year,” said Scudiero.
The contest will be held Saturday, July 18 at 2 p.m. at the St. Jo Frontier Casino. It’s free but participants must be 21 to enter. A $1,000 grand prize will be awarded to whoever can eat the most dogs.
“We’ll be cooking quite a few hot dogs here on a large scale,” said Scudiero. “We could probably be looking at 2,000 hot dogs so that we don’t run out.”
As of Friday afternoon there were already 25 people signed up for the contest. Participants have until July 17 as of closing time to sign up with the St. Joe Frontier Casino, it’s free to participate.
“We would love to have at least 50 for our first ever hot dog contest,” he said. “Amateurs only, no professionals.”
Unlike the national hot dog eating competition, Scudiero said participants will not have to eat any buns, it’s hot dogs only.
“We wanted to make it a little simpler and hopefully a little less difficult on participant’s stomachs,” he said.