Let's put the "8000 followers" on Facebook in context.
I went through this thread to track the growth of our FB following.
In rough (mid-year) numbers, they look like this:
2013: < 900 (Before Stewart and Cindy started managing the FB page.)
2014: 1000 Followers
2015: 2000 Followers
2016: 3500 Followers
2017: 4900 Followers
2018: 5600 Followers
2019: 8000 Followers
Yes, we are seeing EXPONENTIAL growth of our Facebook following - nearly doubling every year. (Up 3100 from 2017)
In 2017, I did a comparison of other FB pages, here are there stats:
Maine Narrow Gauge:
2017: 6150; 2019: 9491
Boothbay Railway Village:
2017: 5470; 2019: 7335
Steamtown:
2017: 17,300; 2019: 27,385
Cumbres and Toltec:
2017: 31,800; 2019: 40,241
Edaville:
2017: 88,290; 2019: 111,200
In short, NO ONE ELSE is seeing exponential growth in their Facebook following. Note that we are now more popular on Facebook than Boothbay Railway Village.
This is no small accomplishment - and has had direct, measurable results in our ridership and exposure to the rest of the railroad preservation community. Thank you Stewart and Cindy (and the rest of the FB team) for making this possible!
Congratulations!