Moonshine is Burger Contest Champion

After weeks of voting, a Champion has been decided in ILLINOISouth Tourism’s Bracket Challenge – Burger Edition. The winner is the Moonshine Store, a remote but beloved burger joint in rural Clark County.

ILLINOISouth created the Bracket Challenge in 2020, which has since promoted area attractions, events, and now burger joints. The tourism bureau hoped that this year’s Burger Edition would help bring some business to the participating restaurants in their 21-county territory.

“Due to the pandemic and workforce issues, many of these small restaurants have been hit incredibly hard,” explains ILLINOISouth Tourism’s Communications Director, Andy Waterman. “If we could get a few hundred eyeballs on these places and drive some new customers through their doors, that would be a win for us and all involved.”

The Burger Edition was indeed successful in terms of reaching folks. This year’s Bracket Challenge was the best yet. Since the contest started in mid-March, it reached over 337 thousand people on social media – and totaled over 167 thousand engagements.

“It’s apparent how much people love their local burgers, there were over 41,000 votes throughout the entire Bracket Challenge,” Waterman explains. “Our favorite part is that so many of these folks aren’t viewing this as a bracket, they see it as a list of new places to try. We know that people will travel an hour or more to try food that they have been looking forward to, and that’s exactly why we did this Bracket Challenge,” adds Waterman.

Fans of the Moonshine Store in rural Clark County showed out in droves during this year’s championship round, accumulating a record-breaking 10,242 votes. Chuck’s Place out of Salem came in second place with over 7,000 votes, which is the second-most votes of any Bracket Challenge ILLINOISouth has done. The best part is that both establishments, as well as others, have seen an uptick in business over the last three weeks.

“We have heard from many places from Chucks and Moonshine to Julians Drive-In in Flora, and they have been extremely busy,” says Waterman. “When they tell us it’s because of the Challenge and give us a big thank you, that means everything to us, that’s why we do what we do,” Waterman adds.

ILLINOISouth Tourism pledged a feature video, free of cost, to the winner of the Bracket Challenge. The bureau is going to work with the owners of Moonshine as well as patrons of the restaurant to tell the story of how Moonshine has become such a staple in our region. ILLINOISouth is hopeful to release that video this summer, so stay tuned to their social channels.