Kevin Baxter leads the talented team behind The Big Dill World’s Largest Pickle Party®, the official world record holder for the largest pickle-themed festival, as recognized by the World Record Academy. Since launching in Baltimore in 2019, The Big Dill has grown into the world’s premier pickle event — drawing an estimated 10,000 attendees to its record-setting Baltimore edition and millions more online. Today, the brand tours nationally, bringing its mix of live entertainment, artisan pickle vendors, over-the-top food and drinks, interactive games, and viral moments to cities across the United States.

With more than 1.2 million followers across social media and an average of 10 million monthly impressions, The Big Dill has built a global community of pickle lovers. Beyond the festival gates, the brand runs a thriving e-commerce platform for pickle-themed apparel, produces viral content, and works with major names like Molson Coors, Jack Daniel’s, Frank’s RedHot, and The Wonderful Company.

Before The Big Dill, Kevin produced large-scale events and also runs Digital Force, a marketing & branding agency that specializes in social media strategy, targeted advertising, experiential events, and PR.

The Big Dill has grown from a quirky idea into a touring festival known as the “World’s Largest Pickle Party®.” When you first launched it, did you imagine it would become a national tour?

The Big Dill was never meant to be a one-off event. I always saw it as a show that could travel to different cities and give people an experience they couldn’t get anywhere else. What makes us the “World’s Largest Pickle Party®” is that it’s officially recognized as the largest pickle-themed party in the world and we now take that production on the road to multiple major markets every year. We started in Baltimore in 2019 because of its pickle history and our partnership with The Cordish Companies and Live! Entertainment Venues. Even before that first event happened, we had St. Louis lined up. When the pandemic stopped live events, we shifted into e-commerce and daily content creation. That built our audience to over 1.2 million followers and now we average 10 million impressions a month. That reach fuels demand for our festivals and keeps the brand growing.

The festival returns to Baltimore this fall as part of the “In My Pickle Era” Tour. What makes Baltimore such an important stop and how has the city played a role in shaping the event’s identity?

Baltimore is home base for The Big Dill. The city has a real history with pickles going back to C.C. Lang & Son in the 1880s and it’s a place that embraces big events. Power Plant Live! was the perfect stage to launch on. Baltimore showed us how to blend food, entertainment, and brand activations into a single experience that feels polished and keeps people smiling. In Baltimore and Maryland in general, we’ve gotten to work with amazing local vendors serving items like pickle pizza, pickle corn dogs, pickle fries, and pickle lemonade. We hand-select each vendor to give our fans the best possible culinary experience. That model is what we now take into other cities.

Over the past five years, The Big Dill has become a major driver of local tourism and revenue. Can you share some of the data that illustrates the festival’s economic impact on Baltimore?

A lot of our Baltimore guests come from outside Maryland. We average about 5,000 people per day and many turn it into a weekend trip. Through our work with the Maryland Tourism Coalition, Maryland.org, and Visit Baltimore, we share hotel links for places like the Courtyard by Marriott, Hyatt at the Inner Harbor, and the Holiday Inn Express & Suites BWI Airport. Many attendees also plan around Orioles or Ravens games and local attractions. As Ruth Toomey, executive director of the Maryland Tourism Coalition, has said, “Each year, the festival sells out quickly, drawing guests from all 50 states. Many attendees are first-time visitors to Maryland and Baltimore City, and many return year after year, making The Big Dill a beloved annual tradition.” It’s a weekend that fills hotels, packs restaurants, and gives vendors their best sales days of the year.

From local food vendors to small businesses and national sponsors, The Big Dill brings together a wide range of partners. How do you approach building brand collaborations that feel organic to the experience?

Any brand that works with us has to be part of the experience, not just on a banner. Molson Coors sponsors our “Pickle Rodeo” mechanical ride. Frank’s RedHot has done food experiences with us. The Wonderful Company is setting up an interactive sampling experience. We’ve partnered with the Portland Pickles baseball team for special appearances, The Original Pickle Shot for unique cocktail experiences, and Tullamore D.E.W. for our pickleback shots. Local vendors matter just as much and we give them a platform to be creative and reach thousands of new customers. The goal is always to make sure guests interact with these brands in a way they’ll remember long after the festival is over.

The festival’s fan base continues to grow, with a strong showing of repeat visitors. What do you think keeps people coming back year after year, and how has that community helped fuel the event’s evolution?

About a third of our attendees come back every year and they’re the heartbeat of the brand. They bring new friends, they dress up, they post about it, and they keep the energy going. It’s about more than just the food — it’s the feeling people leave with. One guest, Gary, posted after our Philadelphia event that it was “so much fun for adults and kids” with “so many pickle-themed foods” and that “the pickle pizza was the best.” That kind of excitement and connection is what pushes us to keep raising the bar and making each year feel fresh.

Beyond the pickles, there’s a whole entertainment ecosystem — from live music, performers, contests and experiential experiences. How do you design the party to be both hyper-niche and widely appealing?

We treat The Big Dill like a first-class entertainment event that just happens to have pickles as the theme. We’ve booked national touring acts, viral social media personalities, and top influencers. From the main stage to interactive games to unique photo ops, we design it so anyone — hardcore pickle fan or not — can have a great time. It’s the mix of live music, creative food and drink, contests, experiences, and performers that you can’t get anywhere else that keeps people coming back.

As The Big Dill expands to new cities, what lessons from Baltimore are you bringing with you, and how do you tailor the event to each local market?

Baltimore taught us to mix our core brand with local flavor. In 2024 we had a record crowd in Philadelphia at Xfinity Live! and Wells Fargo Center, plus coverage on the news and a collaboration with Preston & Steve. This year we’re headed to Globe Life Field and Texas Live! for our Texas debut on November 8, just before National Pickle Day. It’s going to be the biggest National Pickle Day celebration ever with more than 75 vendors, live music, food trucks, competitions, and attractions you can’t find anywhere else. Best Maid Pickles, Martin House Brewing’s pickle beer, Texas State Fair vendors, and The Pickle Priest are just a few highlights. No matter the city, we make sure it feels like The Big Dill while still feeling like it belongs there.

What’s next for The Big Dill brand? Are there any upcoming partnerships, merch drops, or new cities in the works that you can give us a sneak peek at?

We’re adding more cities to the tour, releasing new merch, and working on some big brand collaborations for 2026. The mission stays the same, bring people together, make them smile, and keep pickle culture growing both online and in person. We’ve had conversations with venues like Citi Field in New York, Mall of America in Minnesota, and Diamond Baseball Holdings about bringing The Big Dill experience to ballparks and entertainment districts across the country. We’re already touring the U.S. and selling out in multiple markets, and our focus is always on delivering a fan-first experience. At the end of the day, we’re selling fun just as much as we’re celebrating pickle pop culture.

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