Big Chill bought by Festival Republic

[eFestivals]

news here:-

http://www.efestivals.co.uk/news/09/090925a.shtml

[Paul ™]

Yet another small step towards total festival domination

[st00ka]

Not good news really is it. Reading, Leeds, Glastonbury, Latitude and now the Big Chill. Time for a competition enquiry perhaps?

[Medina]

Yet another small step towards total festival domination

[5co77ie]

Interview with Katrina (festival founder)

Click here

[eFestivals]

It's hard enough already for small independent festival organisers to compete with the big boys (and girls) and moves like this will make it harder still.

I suspect you're right.

From what Katrina says and then reading between the lines, it seems likely that FR/LN/MCD will increase the amount of acts that they have under exclusivity clauses for the festivals they're involved with, meaning that they'll be even fewer acts available to competitors. That's not a good thing for the festival scene in general I don't think.

[barrychuckle]

This must leave Bestival as the only truly independent 40k+ capacity festival left.

Very bad for suppliers to festivals, very bad for consumers attending festivals.

ALso means the chances of some enterprising soul getting a new festival off the ground as very limited.

Why availability of acts would be a worry to the Big Chill is news to me, as they have been running with variations on the same tired Mr Scruff/Norman Jay lineup for over 5 years

[eFestivals]

This must leave Bestival as the only truly independent 40k+ capacity festival left.

not quite true - there's also Creamfields, and perhaps WOMAD (I'm not sure of it's size).

But what's "independent" anyway? There's some of the same people involved in doing Creamfields and Bestival as well as other "independent" festivals, and Bestival - in its 'camp' variety (if not also it's main one) has some of the biggest corporate involvement, and from some corporates who have some of the worst reputations going (with worldwide 'boycott' campaigns for those corporates).

And Bestival is part of the Association of Independent Festivals, which (in addition to the above) thru that grouping has the members working together to some extent, which actually means they cease to be independent to at least some extent.

[barrychuckle]

not quite true - there's also Creamfields, and perhaps WOMAD (I'm not sure of it's size).

But what's "independent" anyway? There's some of the same people involved in doing Creamfields and Bestival as well as other "independent" festivals, and Bestival - in its 'camp' variety (if not also it's main one) has some of the biggest corporate involvement, and from some corporates who have some of the worst reputations going (with worldwide 'boycott' campaigns for those corporates).

And Bestival is part of the Association of Independent Festivals, which (in addition to the above) thru that grouping has the members working together to some extent, which actually means they cease to be independent to at least some extent.

[eFestivals]

Not so much an issue about questionable sponsorship choices by Bestival - that's their decision to adopt an overly commercial approach this year in hoovering up sponsors cheques. Though I too am amazed that they blindly signed up Rowntrees without realising that they are owned by Nestle.

do you think they didn't know?

The wider issue is we now have a company (Live Nation/Festival Republic) who are now in a position where they control the UK festival market and all pricing for suppliers and ticket pricing for consumers.

The only party benefiting from this consolidation is LN/FR who can increase their margins by driving down supplier prices and hiking ticket prices.

By saying just Live Nation/Festival republic, you're not covering everything that this grouping has a handle on.

Involved as well - via their half-ownership of Festival Republic - are Gaiety Investments, who while not much known by that name, have a better known subsidiary called MCD. MCD own Oxegen, have a stake in T in the Park (tho less than they used to, having sold much of it to LN), and who also essentially control V Festival which they own a significant chunk of (I believe 50%, but could be wrong).

I also have someone regularly tell me that MCD also own a chunk of the IoW festival, which I'm not entirely sure is the case, but it could well be.

And MCD &/or Gaiety also own a chunk of Academy Music Group along with Live Nation (and MCD's partners in V Fest, SJM & Metropolis), who operate the o2 Academy venues around the country.

So all in all, these three companies (FR/LN/MCD) control a huge chunk of the UK live music scene.

At some point in the future - I'll make clear this is my personal view and this is just speculation - I expect MCD to sell out all of their parts to Live Nation, leaving Live Nation with everything. My cynical take on things is that it's being done a bit at a time to try to avoid the competition investigations that would have been likely to be triggered if MCD sold out in one go.

[barrychuckle]

do you think they didn't know?

[eFestivals]

Comment posted by Rob Da Bank on their Bestival message board would suggest so!!

Blimey - daft as brush.

I thought Isle of Wight was Kilamanjaro (who are backed by AEG - the guys who own The O2 and a private company)

nope, IoW is run by Solo. The guy who runs Solo has a long history of working closely with Live Nation.

Kilimanjaro has bought into Wakestock, Bloodstock, Big Green Gathering, and also runs Sonisphere. AEG have directly bought into Rock Ness.

The big problem for everyone (from new bands to falafel concession owners) is you now need to need to be on the Live Nation train if you want to be involved in UK festivals to a significant degree - speaking of which, have Efestivals had a offer from Live Nation yet? .

I'm not sure that's necessarily the case. Tho it's certainly true that it works the other way around, and that if you're a major-ish act playing the major-ish festivals under LN/FR/MCD control then they'll want to protect their booking by having that act under a restrictive clause of some kind that stops that act playing at competing festivals outside of their control. Over the years, the number of acts such clauses apply to has increased (taking in acts further and further down the bill), making it more difficult for other festivals to book acts that will attract ticket buyers.

No, efests hasn't had any offer from anyone. Around a year ago - before the economy really hit the shit with Lehmans going down - a major corporation started talking to us about a part purchase of efestivals. The convos didn't get very far tho, as when things went bad they decided it was best not to think about expanding in what was clearly going to be a difficult climate. Would efests have sold to them? I really don't know, as discussions hadn't progressed very far. But as far as corporate buyers go, this was very definitely one of the 'good guys', so it wasn't immediately ruled out.

Edited September 28, 2009 by eFestivals

[Flounder]

It's hard enough already for small independent festival organisers to compete with the big boys (and girls) and moves like this will make it harder still.

That said, if the team behind TBC are happy to go down this path then good luck to them... it's their festival (or at least it was)

[Ringo_Spar]

Comment posted by Rob Da Bank on their Bestival message board would suggest so!!

[Medina]

The trick is to not compete with them

[st00ka]

Next thing we know Live Nation will take out copyright and an exclusivity clause on stripey jumpers... and what will you do then?!

[beamends]

Does a good small festival need to have signed-up acts? For example, if a festival or two put themselves into a category of supporting up and coming bands, with a good set-up to boot, then they could remain independent and provide a good time for punters. By avoiding corporate sponsors, keeping charges for pitches for traders to an absolute minimum and trying if at all possible to involve the local community and use local traders there is the chance that the festival could become a "must play" venue while remaining unattractive to commercial operators. If enough festivals refuse to bow to the corporates then the corporates will have nowhere for "their" acts to play. It's probably too late now for a lot of current festivals, but there's always a second wave when the ineviatable backlash kicks in, and the independents need to make sure they are organised and riding the wave - if not actively creating it.

[eFestivals]

Does a good small festival need to have signed-up acts? For example, if a festival or two put themselves into a category of supporting up and coming bands, with a good set-up to boot, then they could remain independent and provide a good time for punters. By avoiding corporate sponsors, keeping charges for pitches for traders to an absolute minimum and trying if at all possible to involve the local community and use local traders there is the chance that the festival could become a "must play" venue while remaining unattractive to commercial operators. If enough festivals refuse to bow to the corporates then the corporates will have nowhere for "their" acts to play. It's probably too late now for a lot of current festivals, but there's always a second wave when the ineviatable backlash kicks in, and the independents need to make sure they are organised and riding the wave - if not actively creating it.

there's hundreds of festivals that work just on that basis, but all but perhaps a handful have nothing which would interest even the smallest signed (to a major) bands.

The big festivals give them a big audience - and so the chance to make a bigger impact - along with bigger pay-days, less work in reaching large numbers of people, as well as massive media exposure. So while I'm no fan of exclusivity clauses, it's understandable why bands will agree to them; it's a real no-brainer for that band.

Essentially - and it saddens me to say it - the only way a festival operator can fight the exclusivity clauses that some operators use is to play the same game, of trying to get bands tied into you and not them. But you need buckets of cash to play this game, AND you'd probably need to give the band a similar sort of exposure else they'd probably still see the other deals as better for them in the long term.

Outside of that, it's pretty much the case of booking the bands that the big operators don't want, although sometimes some operators are permitted to book a few scraps that the big operators are less interested in.

The one event that seems to be able to work round things is Bestival - but I suspect that has most to do with Rob da Bank's media profile, which probably worries the big operators if he were to be too publicly hostile to them. Even so, I've heard plenty of whispers over the years that he gets mightily pissed off with the limits he has to work within due to the exclusivity clauses of others.

[Medina]

On the subject of exclusivity clauses, I 'lost' a headline act for my own festival this summer when the agent sheepishly admitted, after weeks of negotiation, that he'd already promised the act to another festival as an 'exclusive'.

The other festival? The Big Chill!

And that was before they were bought by Festival Republic!

[Flounder]

Problem comes when they control everything!

Next thing we know Live Nation will take out copyright and an exclusivity clause on stripey jumpers... and what will you do then?!

[5co77ie]

Done and dusted already mate

The point is to put on a festival that they can't/aren't bothered about doing - if you try to take them on its always going to be an uphill struggle through a shitty field. They won't ever be able to control everything as there is a proportion of the festival going public who care about such things and shy away from the corporate.

I can understand why you are twitchy with regard to your event, but there are ways around the big lads

[eFestivals]

On the subject of exclusivity clauses, I 'lost' a headline act for my own festival this summer when the agent sheepishly admitted, after weeks of negotiation, that he'd already promised the act to another festival as an 'exclusive'.

The other festival? The Big Chill!

And that was before they were bought by Festival Republic!

I'd say that was all the agent's fault with pissing you about, and little to do with Big Chill. Just about any festival would prefer to have their headline acts (if not more) as their exclusive, as it works in their favour for sales.

I'm aware of an agent out there who will indicate to enquirers for the massive act he represents that they're likely to get that act, but "these things take time" or similar. I know this because over several years we had several new promoters of new festivals tell us they were going ahead and they were definitely going to get that act.

Of course, the first time we heard it we thought it might be true, but as it came round again and again and again it was clear that the agent was playing games, for whatever reason. Trying to be helpful, we even passed this back to several of those promoters, but they didn't want to take us passing on that info as us being helpful - one in particular took great offence and accused us of wanting his festival to fail. Needless to say tho, none of them got that act.

[Ringo_Spar]

But what happens when they have bought up all the big festivals they can? Do you think they will stop there?

Assuming for a moment that Live Nation employs the same tactics to festivals that it did when it was Clear Channel with American Radio stations - then, once it had bought out the commercial radio stations it then went on to buy up Classic, Urban, Hispanic, Country, and even Religious stations - some on AM which do not have sizeable audiences - the creed seemed to be to try an tap into as many markets as possible.

Considering this model once they've bought into pop festivals, they could branch into metal, retro, and even folk festivals. You could say that any festival that attracts a market they don't already have inroads into could be seen as potentially desirable to them, and more than likely size wouldn't be an issue.

Don't forget that Kilimanjaro have/had an interest in Big Green Gathering - no one expected that.

Of course this assumes that the big boys still have the same ethos as they did with US radio - but with music often finding popularity popularity in different genres who knows what might become the next big thing? Whatever this new music direction could be I'm sure the big boys would want a stake in it.

At the moment possibly it's only the fact that there isn't a lot of profit floating about, and there are still the big ones to buy into that could be holding them back.

[barrychuckle]

Isn't this the tactic AEG tried with Guilfest?

Offer to buy them out, when they don't roll over, go and try and put an event in the same area, crowding out any competition

[eFestivals]

This is a good point to note. Arguably it's already happened in UK live music to some extent with Barfly and smaller Academy rooms taking a lions share of what was the indie gig circuit.

You could ask why would LN/FR be interested in buying up En-Dorset, Bearded Theory, Stokes Bay, ad infinitum as the levels of cash involved are minute in comparison to the events they are already involved in. But then why would multinationals be bothered with smalltime venues that host local bands and first-rung-on-the-ladder tours?

Another point therefore is that in towns where the local indie venue hasn't rolled and sold out, they've opened up a Barfly close to the well-known local indie in direct competition. The indie doesn't get a look-in on tours by upcoming bands anymore. Apply the same mechanics to the festival world and it's suddenly not hard to fear the worse.

all true, but unless it's changed hands, Barfly venues aren't a part of a multinational (they were part of Poonana group or something). Mind you, that as a group looks suspiciously like one of those companies that is set up to establish a business, which when established gets sold to a multinational .... but maybe I'm wrong.