Kölle alaaf & Helau
In Cologne, Dusseldorf and Mainz, Women’s Carnival Night marks the start of a cascade of carnival columns. In cooperation with O2 Telefónica, we have analysed the carnival strongholds on “Rosenmontag”.
The carneval in numbers:
Cologne is the absolute carnival stronghold with over a million revellers on Rose Monday alone, followed by Düsseldorf with around 680,000 and Mainz with around 510,000 carnivalists.
In Cologne, the average age group of 18-39 years (47%) is the youngest. In the other two cities it is the 30-49 age group, with around 50% of all participants in Düsseldorf and around 48% in Mainz.
The longest journeys within Germany were made by party people from North Friesland and Oberallgäu. But the international flair of Cologne was mainly down to the British, who, together with people from Spain and Austria, among others, made up around 5% of international visitors. However, the majority of visitors came from the region or from Germany.
The carnival in Düsseldorf had the highest proportion of international visitors, as well as the highest proportion of visitors from its own city. While the British were particularly well represented in Cologne and Düsseldorf, Dutch visitors were clearly attracted to Düsseldorf. Mainz, on the other hand, had a large number of visitors from the USA, thanks to the large number of US Army soldiers stationed in the region.
An intriguing little detail: Cologne was the place to be for Düsseldorfers on Shrove Monday: twice as many Düsseldorfers attended the parade in Cologne than vice versa. Most people from Leverkusen went to Cologne. Those from Solingen, Monheim and Gladbach, on the other hand, opted for the Düsseldorf carnival.
