The Galway Rose, Ms Karen Broderick, and the Cork Rose, Ms Deirdre Coughlan, are the early favourites as the 44th Rose of Tralee festival gets under way this weekend. The bookies are quoting both of them at 12 to 1.
Combined with the big Tralee race meeting which takes place at the same time, the festival generates a huge tourist income for the town at the end of August each year.
The festival's research in 1999 concluded that it was worth €25 million in cash to the the area. That sum does not include the value of the brand internationally to Tralee and to Kerry, according to Ms Noreen Cassidy, the festival's chief executive.
"Over one quarter of the people who come are from overseas," said Ms Cassidy, a former Rose of Tralee.
Despite annual accusations that the show has become jaded, the RTÉ television ratings for the two evenings of interviews with the Roses, broadcast live from the Dome, remain very high.
RTÉ has signed a new three-year contract with the festival, ending speculation Sky TV were moving in.
The festival committee is looking at new, more permanent headquarters, on property owned by the town council near the water leisure facility, the Aqua Dome.
This is the last year the show will be staged in the tent-like Dome at The Brandon car park opposite the famous hotel, as the council has plans to develop the park.