Is European festival fever a threat to UK music events?

[mike99]

Is European festival fever a threat to UK music events?

Many European summer music festivals have guaranteed sunshine, unlike their UK counterparts

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Sun, sounds and sangria or music, mud and mayhem?

Figures suggest UK music fans are increasingly opting for a festival in Europe instead of one on their home turf, lured by the promise of good weather and a cheaper ticket.

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We find a lot of our customers not only come for the three days of the festival but for seven to 10 days so they get to see more of the country and explore Croatia

Mark Newton

Hideout Festival

Benicassim on the sunny Spanish coast also has big name line-ups but across four days and for £166 - which is about £40 cheaper than Glastonbury and Reading & Leeds festivals (both just over £200) and without the risk of inclement weather.

Festival summer holiday

Sean Tipton from travel association ABTA said tour operators now offer bespoke European festival packages including flights, accommodation and tickets.

"The traditional British festival mud bath isn't everyone's idea of fun," he added.

Croatia in particular is fast becoming a popular festival destination.

Dan Fahey from festicket.com said the country now boasts about "16 brilliant new festivals", including the Unknown Festival, SunceBeat and Echo Festival.

And with super-early bird tickets for Soundwave in Croatia costing just £65, the entry and flights out there can be cheaper than attending a festival in the UK.

The 10,000-strong Hideout dance music festival on the Island of Pag in Croatia has sold out of its £109 tickets.

Hideout Festival in Croatia has been sold out for the past three years

Its festival director Mark Newton said the event "has been mainly attended by Brits" since its inception in 2011.

"With the recession affecting the UK so much," he said, "young Brits don't have the funds to go to both a festival and a summer holiday so now they try to combine the two.

"We find a lot of our customers not only come for the three days of the festival but for seven to 10 days so they get to see more of the country and explore Croatia."

Way Out West in the mild climate of Gothenburg, Sweden, attracts 25,000 festival-goers and charges £180 for a weekend ticket.

The festival's head of communications Joel Borg said there had been "an increasing number of visitors from outside of Sweden, especially the UK and USA," and cited this year's line-up - which includes Neil Young and James Blake - as one of the lures.

'Competition healthy'

Mr Fahey said British customers booking foreign trips via his website had already increased by about 30% compared with last year.

In past years, UK festivals have suffered a blow because of what Isle Of Wight festival director John Giddings called a "saturated market".

Glastonbury is a music festival famous around the world

In total 31 were cancelled or postponed in 2011, and major festivals such as Sonisphere and The Big Chill bowed out of 2012.

The Hop Farm music festival in Kent recently announced the cancellation of this year's event because of poor ticket sales.

So with this in mind, is the rise of the European music festival a palpable threat?

T In The Park festival director Geoff Ellis does not feel this is the case. He said his event is now in its 20th year and was this year named International Music Festival of the Year by concert trade publication Pollstar.

He added the UK has "the best festival culture in the world".

A Bestival spokesman said: "Competition is healthy and ensures we keep up our game in terms of innovation, creativity and value for money."

Blissfields began as a small gathering of friends in 2001

Reading Festival did not provide a comment but the three-day event that attracts 90,000 has been a fixture in the music calendar since 1971.

Glastonbury Festival in Somerset, which returns after a break last year, also did not comment but sold 135,000 tickets in two hours for this year's event.

Price hikes

Criticism has been aimed at Glastonbury, Reading and Bestival for their price hikes in the past 10 years. Glastonbury, for example, now costs £205 before booking and postage costs compared to £105 in 2003.

Bestival has seen a 124% price hike since it first launched in 2004, from £85 to £190.

The Bestival spokesman put the UK festival price rises down to the "huge increase in costs for talent, health and safety and production" but said the festival offered "a unique experience".

Mr Fahey also thinks a British festival ticket is still worth the money.

"Fans still get a broad choice of bands and the evolution of the boutique scene has meant much wider entertainment besides," he said.

'Hard-to-find intimacy'

And the smaller British boutique festival market has indeed seen a surge in popularity.

The 5,000-capacity Standon Calling in Hertfordshire and the 2,500-capacity Blissfields in Hampshire have both had their best year of pre-event sales to date.

Blissfields co-founder Paul Bliss said a smaller event allowed people to feel part of a "festival family".

Standon Calling founder Alex Trenchard said festival-goers were "increasingly looking for that hard-to-find intimacy".

Mr Trenchard added that festivals in the UK could easily offer European festivals a run for their money.

"The festivals that are doing well offer a unique experience at an affordable price, whether they're in the UK or abroad."

[Wooderson]

Git.

[daniel.k]

On the price front, V charges for two days what most places would charge for three. Euro festivals wouldnt do that

[mike99]

Git.

[ErnestWorthing]

It's really hard to read, can you just link to the article in future?

[5co77ie]

Nope, they'd like it to be and it was when air fares are cheap, but flights aren't so cheap anymore. And I would guess there are less Brits going abroad to festivals than 2 years ago. Hop Farm cancelled for various reasons but bare in mind whilst it's capacity for 2013 was 10,000, that's a fifth what it was in 2012. Plus 10,000 is about the biggest capacity of the Croatian festivals like Hideout which are probably at their most popular at present, due to a more guaranteed climate.

Your more established European festivals like Werchter, Roskilder, Pukkelpop, Tomorrowland etc have about the same number of Brits attend each year, and remember they also have much the same weather as we do.

As for price hikes - Glastonbury in '89 was £28 a decade on it was £83 (that's nearly a x3 price rise). Glastonbury in 2003 was £105, and a decade on it's not yet doubled in price ( £5 under) and Glastonbury always matches or is slightly under the cost rise of other events.

As for saturation - we were we're now about right the same capacity (of total festivals available) each summer for the last 3 years now. Unpopular festivals fall and new ones rise.

If anything the fact there are European festivals makes the line-ups stronger, with bands more likely to travel to Europe for a string of festival dates. Without that appeal they would remain in the native continents which are all seeing a surge in home festivals from America, to Asia.

Edited May 20, 2013 by 5co77ie

[Badlands]

If you don't like it don't read of it. End of

[mike99]

Why not try adding some comment and opinion of your own onto these forums instead of just copy and pasting stories from other sites then adding stupid posts like 'agreed' and 'patience'.

You're a boil on this forums arse Mike.

[Guest]

If you don't like it don't read of it. End of

[bigjontour]

Why not try adding some comment and opinion of your own onto these forums instead of just copy and pasting stories from other sites then adding stupid posts like 'agreed' and 'patience'.

You're a boil on this forums arse Mike.

[Northernsoul45]

_{io think the days of being able to do european festivals really cheap are over...most festival goers are very savvy about what festivals are abroad now int erms of the establshed ones, and have the cheap flights booked up (cheap the prices from the uk to barcelona in sonar week for example) and for the newer ones (usualyl in croatia)...the price & accommodation isn't all that cheap when you add it up...then with flight costs...}

_{i've done a few euroepan festivals...this year going to Uniknwon in croatia in september...ticket price itself is very good...(£110) and if you wish to camp, then thats it...but we're going to an aprtment, so money mounts up from there and its not the easiet place to get too/back from scotland. (airport/flight wise)}

[lifelessfool]

Personally for me I can just about afford to go to 2 festivals a year one is always a European one and the other is generally on a payment scheme and that position has been given to Bestival. I think a festival ticket and flights works out as about the same as a UK ticket. Primavera was certainly cheaper than my voyage to bestival, the weather doesn't really play a major factor for me I'm just happy to be out and enjoying music.

One other thing I think european festivals do a lot better than UK ones is travel both Pukkelpop andHurricane have provided free train transport which really keeps the cost down, so for me I generally prefer my foreign land visits as I get to explore a new city and go to a festival where the crowd is full of less dicks ( or even if they are dicks I can't hear them anyway.

[Northernsoul45]

Personally for me I can just about afford to go to 2 festivals a year one is always a European one and the other is generally on a payment scheme and that position has been given to Bestival. I think a festival ticket and flights works out as about the same as a UK ticket. Primavera was certainly cheaper than my voyage to bestival, the weather doesn't really play a major factor for me I'm just happy to be out and enjoying music.

One other thing I think european festivals do a lot better than UK ones is travel both Pukkelpop andHurricane have provided free train transport which really keeps the cost down, so for me I generally prefer my foreign land visits as I get to explore a new city and go to a festival where the crowd is full of less dicks ( or even if they are dicks I can't hear them anyway.

[eFestivals]

the eurofestivals do seem to have a better crowd, and the british that are there, are all decent, not scumbag/neds that you sadly might get at festivals back here.

hmmm, I don't think you're really comparing like with like when you come up with that.

For example, the Croatian festies are small, and if you went to similarly small UK festivals I'm happy to bet that you'd find them similarly free of dickheads.

[lifelessfool]

Did UK festivals not experience a boom in the past decade? ( I can't really compare as through much of the nineties I was still in primary school) Is it not a case of festivals deflating somewhat naturally with the decline in there "trendyness" which somewhat arose form the popularity of indie landfill? I don't think European festivals can be blamed for pulling people away too much I just generally prefer my time abroad.

[Guest]

my daughter went to Benicassim and said never again, it was crammed with dickheads

[jammy2211]

The Crotians / Serbian / eastern Europe type ones seem hugely popular with most people i know, uni students are just graduated. Know tons of people going or been to one or more, and I'm heading hideout this year with a group of 8. Most those guys went to other festivals in the past too, but arn't bothering this year. I'm doing DL and hopefully Reading too though.

Not sure the big EU ones like Rock Am Ring, Pukkelpop, Rock wrechter etc are having as much of an impact as they were though - they've become less easy to make good value then 5 years ago. Different type of festival altogether though.

[Thearg]

To a degree but the more popular festivals become internationally the more people will get into the festival scene.A friend of mine from the states said that the Americans are in awe of things like Glastonbury and its a dream to come to Britain and do a ''Proper'' festival.

I suppose the grass is always greener.

I think the package holidays are more in danger,why book a week in some resort when you can go to an international festival instead.

I know what I'd rather do.

[Paul ™]

2nd time to Exit Festival in Serbia this year, last year I spent less there overall than going to say Glasto or T in The Park and that was a week in the sunshine included.

[Guest]

To a degree but the more popular festivals become internationally the more people will get into the festival scene.A friend of mine from the states said that the Americans are in awe of things like Glastonbury and its a dream to come to Britain and do a ''Proper'' festival.

I suppose the grass is always greener.

I think the package holidays are more in danger,why book a week in some resort when you can go to an international festival instead.

I know what I'd rather do.

[Paul ™]

A lot of European festivals are at night time (well Exit runs from about 7pm - 8am) so you can do both, sleep early morning, hit the beach etc, then head to the festival.. it works well.

[Thearg]

why go to a festival when you want to spend a week on a beach?

[Guest]

Because the youngans go on holiday for the nightlife,the beach is a small part of it and a lot off international festivals have the beaches as well like Bennicassim but there's not much there,you would't go just for the beaches.

When I want a beach holiday I go to Goa or used to back when the full moon parties were on or Koh phangan an the like.

[Katster]

Outside of the uk I've only ever ventured to benicassim back in 2006 so I'm no expert but back then it cost me about the same price as Glastonbury but I was there for a full week and then went to Ibiza for a week afterwards (I obviously spent a fair chunk in Ibiza but the initial travel cost was all included).

I prefer British festivals personally. Choose wisely and you don't get the idiots and whilst I love the sunshine I prefer a bit of mud and even some rain if I'm very honest but that's my personal preference and I know I'm not 'the norm'

In terms of logistics I found it no more difficult carting my stuff over to Spain than I did to Glastonbury and one thing I did love about benicassim was going to the beach/waterpark during the day then heading to the festival at night. Good times, I'd like to go back!

[Paul ™]

I would of imagined its a bit of a nightmare travelling to them with all your gear ?