The world's second-largest folk and beer festival after Munich's Oktoberfest kicked off on Friday — Stuttgart's Cannstatter Wasen.

Around 300 innkeepers and market traders will open up daily until October 12, hoping to match last year's 4.6 million visitors.

Proceedings began with the traditional keg tap at just after 4:30 p.m. by Stuttgart Mayor Frank Nopper. It took just two hammer blows to get the beer flowing.

Baden-Württemberg state premier Winfried Kretschmann from the Green Party was also on stage at the opening of the festival's 178th edition, accompanied by brass bands and fanfare groups.

Attendance will hinge on weather and consumer mood, with festival host spokesman Werner Klauss saying that, with Germany's economy still in the doldrums, economic conditions seem tougher this year. Table bookings for the eight festival tents have remained roughly the same, he said, but in some cases have declined.

"You have to recognize that times have become more difficult for innkeepers," Klauss said ahead of the event.

What is the Cannstatter Wasen?

The three-week beer festival and traveling funfair is sometimes also referred to by foreign visitors as the Stuttgart Beer Festival, although it is really more of an autumnal fair.

Nevertheless, the Volksfest is widely considered to be the second-largest beer celebration in the world.

Besides the beer, the Cannstatter Wasen features huge fairground rides, colorful parades, live music stages, hearty Swabian food stalls, candy stands, and a bustling market with games and crafts.

The festival traces its origins to 1818 as a harvest festival created to celebrate agriculture after years of crop failures and famine caused by the volcanic winter following the 1815 Mount Tambora eruption in Indonesia.

In subsequent decades, the Volksfest evolved beyond its agricultural focus. Traditionally a parade also takes place, the first of which was held in 1841 and featured more than 10,000 participants and 100,000 spectators.

Oktoberfest — which started last Saturday and runs until October 3 — started earlier as a celebration of Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria marrying Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen in 1810.

There's no figure as to how many hectoliters of beer are sold at the festival, because in Stuttgart — unlike in Munich — this is treated as a trade secret.

One estimate is of about two million liters (more than 500,000 gallons), compared with some 6 to 7 million liters at the larger Bavarian celebration.

Edited by: Zac Crellin