Most other krewes select from a pool of rental floats, and their themes tend to be generic in nature. In Orleans Parish, a city ordinance prohibits the use of the same float more than twice in the Central Business District during any given parade season. The method of selecting Mardi Gras royalty varies from krewe to krewe. The King of Carnival is chosen by the inner circle of the School of Design, the sponsoring organization for the Rex parade. Some krewes hold random drawings to pick their king or queen.
Most clubs charge the selected monarch a fee to reign.
Their collective 3,500 members toss more than 2 million cups, 3.5 million doubloons and 350,000 gross of beads. They also annually invite guest celebrities to ride in their parades. Some of the more popular stars to have appeared are Bob Hope, Dolly Parton, Wayne Newton, John Goodman, Jackie Gleason, Dennis Quaid, Kirk Douglas, Harry Connick Jr. and the Beach Boys. Before the age of recycling, the success of Mardi Gras in Orleans Parish was sometimes measured by the amount of trash collected by the New Orleans Sanitation Department. Reprinted with permission from Arthur Hardy's Mardi Gras Guide.