This is an interesting topic. I go to Bonneville on the cheap. Just me and my Toyota pickup set up for camping. This is the way a lot the spectators and casual crew type participants do it. Expenses on the Salt, large or in my case small since I'm not yet running a car, are minimal. In any case that all goes into a stream that only secondarily touches Wendover.
I camp out, buy my showers, gas, ice and typically once a day meals at the Sinclair truck stop at exit 4. A couple or 3 times a week I'll go in town to Smiths market or the carwash or to go to one of the small eateries. My total expenses for the trip including the 1400 mile round trip from California has been running around $300 for many years but in the last 2 or 3 has crept into the $400-$500 range due to the price of gas and my increasing propensity to eat at the Red Flame and the Salt Flats Cafe at the truck stop where both the food and the company is pretty good.
One thing that always surprises me is the amount of gas I use during the week running around the Salt and to and from town or the truck stop.
From a Wendover economics standpoint the thing that's important is whether the money you spend is buying labor for services or "stuff" Since about the only thing actually manufactured in Wendover is ice (the little ice plant has 2 or 3 employees) and fertilizer, and we don't buy the latter, money for stuff mostly leaves the area.
Seems to me that the biggest "bang for the buck spent" for the town is what we spend in restaurants for prepared food, which is a pretty labor intensive process. The least is probably gasoline.
But things like direct labor we buy for things like repair services, BNI hires of local folks for security and anything else that is mostly labor do count. Another thing is tips we leave in restaurants and casinos. And hopefully not to big a thing is traffic citations.
Just some added thoughts here---
And for any of you guys trying to figure out how to get to Speedweek on the cheap .... it can be done if two or three can share the gas and the camping arrangements, cook your own food, minimize driving around the salt during the day and learn a few tricks.
Ed Weldon
Captain Eddie's Day Old Fish market - Home of the Bonneville Salt Fish
Featuring the miracle of modern mechanical refrigeration.
Los Gatos (on the far side of the mountain), CA
