The USI art club loves corn.

Their love for corn shows every October when they set up their fall festival booth. Along the outside walls of the small colorful booth are paintings with corn strategically placed somewhere within the famous portrait. Lining the bottom of the canopy is a small scale version of the Creation of Adam, from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, with an ear of corn between the fingers of God and Adam.

Inside the booth however, is where the true creativity comes out. There is not a single bare spot on any of the walls, the interior is completely covered in amateur corn art, and corn interjected quotes and puns, a whole lot of puns.

“My favorite part about the booth is looking for new quotes,” president of art club Kelsey Roach said. “Even after three years, I keep finding new ones I’ve never seen before.”

The club has been selling ears of buttery corn every year since the early ’90s and is operated by students involved in the club.

“With eight art students in such close quarters of course it’s going to be fun and interesting,” senior art major Chris Thompson said. “A lot of eccentric and extraordinary things happen.”

The students cook the corn in the booth, butter it up, roll the corn, take the money, assemble everything, give out drinks and advertise the booth all while wearing corn hats.

“We try to keep everything as interactive as possible,” Roach said. “We have a corn cob costume that someone walks around in, we do chalk and hopscotch with little kids, a lot of people want pictures with us in our corn hats and there is always a lot of yelling and chanting.”

It is not all fun and games though. The students are also in charge of set up and tear down of the booth. Every year in the weeks before Fall Fest they have to assess the damage done to the booth and replace parts so they are health department approved.

“For the last 10 years, we have been systematically replacing parts of the booth,” Roach said. “It seems like every year we have to replace a little part of it.”

Most of the art club’s money comes from the one week of selling $2 ears of corn to people walking by their booth. Last year they raised $14,000 by the end of the week by selling 200 cases of corn provided and delivered daily by Farm Boy food services.

This year they have 250 cases to sell each containing 48 ears. That is 12,000 ears of corn to butter and sell.

“We have to get rid of the corn each day,” said Chuck Armstrong, faculty adviser and graphic design assistant professor. “It’s usually not that hard. Surprisingly drunk people love corn.”

The art club is one of six USI student-group booths that are regulars at the Fall Fest.

The Tau Kappa Epsilon is the third highest grossing booth, falling behind the Nutclub booth and Brainsandwich booths, Tau Kappa Epsilon’s Fall Fest chair Gil Garrison said.

“It costs us about $10,000 to run the booth and depending on the weather we bring in anywhere from $25,000 to $40,000 selling our Stromboli,” Garrison said.

Tau Kappa Epsilon’s booth, like the art club’s, is student run, and they put in all the work. They cook the food, advertise, set up and take down the booth and make sure everything runs as smoothly as possible. Most of their work they usually do for set up is cut in half this year with the purchase of a new booth.

“We are known for our big, red booth, and we still will,” Garrison said. “It’s just a bigger, newer red booth.”

The Tau Kappa Epsilon booth has sat at slot 73 since it started selling Stromboli in 1964. Farm Boy Food Services provides Tau Kappa Epsilon with precooked sausage, peppers, tomato sauce, onions, green peppers and Lewis Bakery supplies the bread.

The week can get stressful being shoulder to shoulder with a bunch of men slaving over hot food, but Tau Kappa Epsilon’s members try to make it a fun experience for everyone involved, sophomore Tau Kappa Epsilon member Kyle Courtney said.

“It doesn’t seem like it at the time, but it’s one of the best weeks of the year,” Courtney said. “It’s stressful but it’s a great way to bond with the brothers and get to know each other and interact with the community.”

Getting everyone involved and keeping them entertained is also a big part of Tau Kappa Epsilon’s process. Their chants can be heard blocks throughout the festival and they let everyone know when fresh batches of $4 Stromboli are ready when they chant out “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one… HOT STROMS!”