Last weekend saw the return of The Game Fair to Blenheim Palace – a location that many see as the true spiritual home of this 3-day festival of the British countryside.
We ventured out of Wales for two of the three days, recording an episode for the Wild Food People podcast, meeting up with old friends and nearly getting lynched in a pub in rural Oxfordshire.
In it’s 66th year and with over 136,000 visitors – is the Game Fair worth a visit for the wild food enthusiast, and is it still relevant to the modern British countryside?
A long (ish) history
Like many aspects of British conservation – it all comes down to gamekeepers and landowners.
A tradition had developed for gamekeepers to congregate for the second day of Crufts (gundogs…) and by the mid-1950s it was clear that there was substantial desire for a standalone event for the game and fieldsports community.
The first true Game Fair was held in 1958, organised by Nigel Gray with sponsorship from the Country and Business Land Owner Association. It was held near Stetchworth in East Cambridgeshire, with 8,000 visitors attending that first two-day event.
The current incarnation of The Game Fair is organised by Stable Events, with 25th-27th July 2025 at Ragley Hall pencilled in (according to their website).
2024 Game Fair
In the last episode of the podcast I confidently stated that there are actually four Game Fairs happening simultaneously:
- The Fashion Game Fair
- The Luxury Retail Game Fair
- Hook and Bullet Retail Game Fair
- Comms and Policy Game Fair
I’m sticking with that assertion after spending the last few days stomping around a field in Oxfordshire.
The Fashion Game Fair and Luxury Retail Game Fair were apparent at every corner, from the tweed+fedora fashionistas wandering the metal walkways to the fine art galleries and the array of Aston Martins. You could easily drop the GDP of a small country in those tents and still need to break out the credit card – that £27,000 mirror would look good above the TV though.
Hook and Bullet Retail Game Fair was centred around the legendary Gunmakers Row, although the availability of firearms themselves was tilted towards shotguns rather than rifles. You could find pretty much every fieldsports and hunting clothing brand represented, with one of our favourites Fortis Clothing occupying a substantial chunk of the second row. Elsewhere you could find fine, handmade Italian stalking boots, lead-free shotgun cartridges and walk-in game larders the size of our lounge.
The bit we were interested (although I do really want that dry-ageing chamber that Tarrant had on their stand) was the Comms and Policy Game Fair. With representation from pretty much every outlet from British hunting media there was plenty to see, listen to and ask questions about. The Carter Jonas Game Fair Theatre was always overflowing out into the walkway, with people crowding in to hear some of the stories and debate on everything from the future policies of the new Labour government to Dick and Angel Strawbridge talking about life in France vs England.
Venerable publication The Field were there, handing out copies of the latest issue alongside their new youth-oriented mag The Field Junior. Elsewhere you could find the Guns on Pegs stand, and relative-newcomer Scribehound had taken over a strategic corner near the food village.
BASC were of course present, overlooking the main arena and the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust were sandwiched in between The Field and Countryside Alliance on the main drag.
If you wanted to go and talk to someone about land management, practical conservation and how the British countryside was/is/will be managed then this was your big chance.
That bloke with a sign on a stick.
We arrived early on both Friday and Saturday, seeking out people who were willing to talk to us about conservation and wild food – and if the Game Fair was still relevant. If you want to hear the answers then you’ll have to listen to the show next week – but there are a few very surprising ones in there.
What was even more surprising was that we were only kicked off one stand (a cartridge manufacturer that flat-out refused to discuss food of any type) and only one other brand backed out of the interview partway through. I would like to think it was because of my hard-hitting style, relentlessly seeking the truth – but it may have something to do with my crudely-painted sign nailed to a bit of hazel I found in a hedge.
Our accommodation was at the cheapest campsite I could find – The Gate Hangs High over near Banbury. A great country pub serviced by the fine Hook Norton Brewery, our stay was only tainted by my nearly getting taken “for a long walk in the fields” after an incident involving a game of Aunt Sally, a halogen light and poorly-aimed lump of wood.
You’ll have to subscribe on Patreon to hear the rest of that story…
Over the two days we managed to get 20 interviews, from leading conservation and countryside writers, professional photographers, chefs, gamekeepers, celebrities and a few of the retailers attending the show. That episode is being edited right now, and should be out to the public sometime next week.
Does it still matter?
I think it’s fair to say that The Game Fair has shifted solidly towards retail and lifestyle, but if you look past the fashion and the expensive gins you can still find plenty of the DNA of the British countryside. While we were interviewing people for the podcast there was a common theme – they really, really do care about what they do and the world they occupy.
Over the past few years there have been several moves towards getting British hunting, fieldsports and country sports recognised as a distinct and indigenous cultural heritage – something of this place, of these islands. These days my focus is more on food than fieldsports (and if I can’t eat it then I need a damned good reason to kill it). When you speak to the people involved in this world you can see that cultural distinctness, in a way that is rarely represented on British television and in mainstream media.
If The Game Fair serves any purpose for the modern British countryside and conservation it is that of a rendezvous, a gathering of like-minded people to one place. I can find plenty to disagree with in some of the views shared at the Game Fair, but I cannot deny that it does give a voice and representation to a community that is largely hidden from public view.
Every year Wild Food People run a calendar of foraging and wild food courses in North Wales.
From forests and meadows to seashore and coastal – all of our courses are focused on food, ecology and giving participants the confidence to go and find these foods for themselves.
We work with nature.
We deliver expert foraging and wild food training as part of our wider work managing habitats in North Wales.
Every single one of our courses and events feeds back into improving those habitats, helping to provide healthy ecosystems for our local wildlife and communities.