Fake Blues Bucks found at festival

COLUMBIA — Vendors at this weekend’s Roots ’N’ Blues ’N’ BBQ festival were asked to accept Blues Bucks on the premise that the fake money, in denominations of $1 and $10, would be safer than cash.

But some attendees at the festival — sponsored by Boone County National Bank — appear to have foiled the plan: They counterfeited their own Blues Bucks.

It’s not clear how many of the bad bills were passed, but festival coordinator Mary Wilkerson believes the counterfeiting will have little impact on the event’s revenue. Wilkerson said police were not called to investigate.

“Since it had such a small impact, we are not going to make a big deal about it,” she said.

Boone County National Bank officials noticed the suspect bills Saturday, Wilkerson said.

The official $10 Blues Bucks were blue, had printing on one side and featured logos of the bank and festival.

“Some of the bills felt different than the others,” she said. “Once we knew they were counterfeit, we made sure vendors knew of it.”

Hoss’s Market and Rotisserie was a vendor that came into contact with some of the counterfeit bills Saturday. Five or six customers tried to use the bills, said Trish Koetting, co-owner of Hoss’s.

“The counterfeit bills were printed on laser paper, had a slightly different color and were slightly smaller than the originals,” Koetting said. “We were told not to accept them.”

Koetting and her staff turned down the bogus bills.

Wilkerson said two vendor coordinators walked around the festival to let vendors know what to look for.

“Festival coordinators did a great job of making us aware that someone was counterfeiting bills,” Koetting said.

Columbia police were not alerted of the incident because the Blues Bucks were not real currency, Wilkerson said.

Capt. Zim Schwartze of the Columbia Police Department said in an e-mail that she had no knowledge of the counterfeiting. Schwartze was head of security for the event.

Despite the counterfeiting, the use of Blues Bucks instead of real currency was beneficial in cutting out the possibility of stealing, Koetting said.

“We love Blues Bucks for security purposes,” Koetting said. “It takes the pressure off of employees who have to handle money.”