Jobs coming as Polar Express ticket sales soar past forecast

By John Howell

The demand for tickets on the Batesville Polar Express Train Ride has been so great that Iowa Pacific Holdings officials are planning to increase train size for the event.

“We’re going to pass our original projection of 35,000 passengers before we even open for business,”  Polar Express Special Events Director Debra Goodman wrote Batesville Main Street Manager Colleen Clark and Alderman Eddie Nabors in an e-mail, shared with her permission, this week. “Our ticket sales have surpassed 20,000 tickets.”

“We are scrambling to increase our train size to accommodate what will be a significantly larger number of visitors to Batesville!!” Goodman stated. 

Mary Graydon has been hired as event manager for the Batesville train rides that will begin in November. A building has been rented on the Square to house Graydon’s offices. 

Polar Express will begin holding job fairs within the next two weeks to hire seasonal positions and at least 100 jobs, according to Goodman. Dates and locations will be announced soon.

Supervisory jobs will first be filled and applicants can find qualifications for those positions online at indeed.com. They include train, ticketing, administrative and gift shop supervisors.