Tulare's New Fanfinity-Con Prices Its Masquerade Ball Above the Con Itself

At checkout, a two-day pass to Fanfinity-Con at the International Agri-Center costs $20 plus fees. One ticket to the Masquerade Ball it holds Saturday night costs $35 plus fees. That means four hours on Saturday evening cost more than two full days on the convention floor, and that one price tells you most of what you need to know about this weekend at 4500 S. Laspina St.

Visit Visalia lists Fanfinity-Con as a "new Comic-Con style event" running November 7 and 8. The next weekend, the Rusty Roots Holiday Show comes to the Tulare County Fairgrounds, and its price list follows the same logic. Each event charges extra for one window of time and keeps everything else cheap. If you know which window that is, you can plan both Saturdays around it.

The Night Costs More Than the Weekend

Here's the ticket list from the organizer's TicketSpice checkout page, where tickets are actually sold. Each price below has a small service fee added at checkout.

The organizer's own tickets page shows higher numbers for some items, including $25 for two days, $30 for VIP and $480 for a table. The ball is $35 on both pages, and the checkout total is what you'll actually pay.

The daytime tickets are close together. Going from one day to two adds $5, and early entry adds another $5. The evening is where the prices jump. One ball ticket costs $15 more than the whole weekend. A VIP table doesn't include ball admission, so seating eight people at one runs $350 plus eight $35 tickets, or $630 before fees. The person who books a table has to be 21 or older, and ball tickets are capped at 400.

The vendor side is set up the same way. Every booth comes with two vendor passes, and every listing says those passes don't get you into the ball. The ball is its own product with its own ticket, and the organizer is pricing it that way.

It's also being promoted that way. The Fanfinity-Con homepage gives the ball the longest description on the page. It runs from 7 to 11 p.m. on Saturday, November 7, and costumes from comics, anime, fantasy, steampunk, vampires, Bridgerton, Star Wars and medieval stories are all welcome. There's also a special dance that guests can learn in advance from a waltz video on the site, so everyone on the floor knows the same steps when the song starts. No other part of the weekend comes with homework.

What the Daytime Ticket Buys

Since the ball costs extra, it's fair to ask what the $15 or $20 gets you. The organizer lists a cosplay contest on Saturday with prizes, several brackets and a group category. There are trading card tournaments for Pokémon, Magic, One Piece and Star Wars, and D&D tables for anyone who would rather play than compete. The schedule also includes a medieval knights tournament, and Visit Visalia describes an outdoor area set up like a Renaissance faire.

On the vendor floor, the site promises artists, writers, builders, innovators and bakers. The booth prices give a sense of who it can draw. An Artist Alley table is $125 and a standard 10-by-10 booth is $250, low enough for small sellers and independent artists. Early-bird vendor pricing ended September 1. As of this week, food vendor booths are listed as sold out, and that's the only category marked that way.

Food selling out first makes sense for a first-year event at a site with plenty of room. Families coming for an afternoon, the people who make the free under-10 ticket worthwhile, will want lunch. The ball, by contrast, is 18 and over only.

Saturday, November 7, in Order

If you're doing the full day and night, here's how it fits together:

1. 9 a.m. VIP pass holders get in an hour early. Visit Visalia lists a 9 a.m. start, which lines up with the VIP hour.
2. 10 a.m. General admission opens, according to the checkout page.
3. During the day The cosplay contest runs Saturday, alongside the card tournaments and D&D tables.
4. 2:30 p.m. Across town, the Tulare Public Library at 475 North M Street screens "Masters of the Universe," rated PG-13. It's free and you don't need to register. The library's event listing gives two end times, 4:45 and 4:50 p.m., so plan for the later one. The library's event page has the details.
5. 5 p.m. The con floor closes.
6. 7 to 11 p.m. The Masquerade Ball, 18 and over.

That two-hour gap between the floor closing and the ball starting is when most people will go home to change or grab dinner. Sunday, November 8, keeps the same daytime hours with no evening event, and its single-day pass is $10, five dollars less than Saturday's. The checkout page lists the venue as the Tulare Ag Center at 4500 S Laspina.

One Week Later, the Premium Moves to the First Hour

On November 14 and 15, the Rusty Roots Show brings its holiday market to the Tulare County Fairgrounds at 620 S. K Street. It has a lot more history than Fanfinity-Con. Tulare native Whitney Scarbrough started the market in Visalia in 2011, and when it held a holiday show at the Agri-Center in November 2021, the International Agri-Center described it as a traveling marketplace for new, antique, vintage, repurposed, upcycled and handmade goods, with food trucks.

This year's show advertises more than 100 vendors, plus a free ornament exchange where you bring one ornament and take one home.

Rusty Roots also charges extra for one window, but it's at the start of the day:

• Saturday, 9 to 10 a.m. Early bird admission, $10
• Saturday, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. General admission, $5
• Sunday, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. General admission all day, $5

Getting in during the first hour costs twice as much as any other time all weekend. At a vintage and handmade market, that's the hour when one-of-a-kind items are still on the tables. Veterans with ID get in free, and so do children 15 and under who are with an adult.

The fairgrounds' own calendar lists Saturday doors at 10 a.m., which matches general admission. The organizer sells the 9 a.m. early-bird entry on top of that. If you want the first hour, go by the organizer's schedule. You can skip the line by buying tickets online.

Getting Into the Fairgrounds This Year

The fairgrounds entrance has moved, and that will catch out anyone parking where they always have. The organizer's directions say the fairgrounds are under construction, so the entrance is now on the north side, on Martin Luther King Street.

• Parking is free, on K Street and Martin Luther King Street.
• Permitted accessible parking is on Martin Luther King Street and in the K Street lot.
• There's no ATM on site, and not every vendor takes cards. Bring cash.
• The entrance accepts card, Venmo and cash.
• Bring a wagon or cart for anything bulky.
• No pets. Service animals only.

There is a larger project in the works at the fairgrounds. In March 2023, the 24th District Agricultural Association's board minutes reported a $12 million grant for a new 34,000-square-foot multipurpose building that would replace two existing buildings. The project was put back out to bid in 2025 as the "Tulare Resiliency Center - Buildings 1-2." The fair board's August 2026 agenda still lists it under "Resiliency Center Bid Update," and the amended grant agreement runs through March 31, 2027. The agendas don't say whether that project has anything to do with the work behind this month's moved entrance. For now, the practical part is simple: use the north gate on Martin Luther King Street.

The rest of November has smaller things going on. The Tulare Historical Museum's Heritage Art Gallery lists a Christmas Village and Train Exhibit for the month. Watch the gallery page for dates and hours. St. Aloysius School's Holiday Marketplace is set for November 29. The ball tickets and the early-bird hour are the two things on this list most likely to sell out or come and go, so buy those first.

Sean Harper is a Realtor and mortgage broker based in Visalia, and he reads a price list the same way he reads a contract. He looks for where the money is concentrated and asks why. If you're weighing a move in or around Tulare and want that kind of straight read on the numbers, reach out to Sean Harper. Let's Connect.