Max Flint: Summer wouldn’t be summer without a festival. There are more than 500 of them taking place around the UK this year. So why do we all like standing in a muddy field so much? Helping to find the answers tonight I’m joined by Myleene Klass!

Do you wish you were up there then?

Myleene Klass: It is amazing to play to such a large crowd – but I’ve gone to loads of festivals as a punter too.

In fact 3 million of us go to festivals each year. What started with flower power has turned into big business.

Max (commentary): We meet the men who’ve got millions riding on the success of their festivals. It’s a quick way of losing money if you don’t get it right.

John Giddings: You gamble millions of pounds, hoping that people will buy tickets to see the bands you think they want to see.

Melvin Benn: If you can’t find the audience, or you’ve got the wrong product, well, you’re buggered really, the same way you are in any business really.

Myleene (commentary): We’re behind the scenes as disaster strikes a fledgling festival.

Sophie Docker: there was a massive storm with thunder and lightning and it was all very dramatic .

Max (commentary): And meet the entrepreneurs who are profiting by catering to the needs of the millions of festival goers.

Suzy Tangerine: Last year’s turnover was upwards of a quarter of a million.

Max (commentary): The rise in popularity of festivals has seen the return of some familiar faces

John Lydon: This way. Welcome to ‘Chez Rotten’.

Max: Tonight on the Money Programme we’ll investigate whether the future of festivals lies with the experienced, old hand promoters…

Myleene: Or the bright young things trying to make their mark on the festival scene.

Myleene (commentary): I’m on my way to Somerset to see how the organisers of the Sunrise Celebration Festival are getting on. We’ve been following them for the past few months.

Sophie Docker has been working day and night to ensure the festival is a success.

Myleene: So Sophie, here we are on what is to be the site for the festival, you’re clearly setting up, how’s it all going?

Sophie: It’s going really well actually. ‘Cause it’s the 3rd year now, we’ve got quite a few things in place and it’s a lot smoother than it’s been in the past.

Myleene (commentary): Sunrise sells itself as the country’s leading sustainable and eco-friendly festival.

Myleene: tell me all about your green credentials because this is something that’s quite new to me as far as festival PR goes, this is quite a new angle.

Sophie: Yeah, it is, there’s not many festivals who are making a big deal about the green stuff, and it’s something that’s only new in the music industry generally I think. But we run the whole event on renewable energy sources, EDIT…in addition to that we’ve got compost toilets, which you can see around the edge of the field looking like sentry boxes over there.

Myleene: Oh is that what they are? I thought that’s where you could go birdwatching!

Sophie: It does look like that doesn’t it.

Myleene (commentary): But eco- friendly toilets and the like don’t come cheap. It’s costing Sophie and the Sunrise team over £700,000 to get the festival off the ground. And there’s no guarantee they’ll get their money back. So far this summer sixteen festivals have been cancelled.

Myleene: Now there is quite a lot on the line, because you’ve put a lot of your own finance into this, so there’s a personal investment. How is that making you feel, because it’s crunch time?

Sophie: Yeah, obviously it’s a little bit nerve-wracking. I mean, there’s that, there’s the personal-loss aspect of it, but there’s also the fact that it’s a festival that lost money two years previously, and EDIT…if the festival lost a lot of money this year it would be very hard to carry it on.

Myleene (commentary): Unless they sell out early they’ll be relying on gate sales and punters won’t turn up if it’s raining.

Myleene: The rain clouds are clearly in the sky, they, they play a huge part in this story, how do you feel about those?

Sophie: Menacing [blowing them away]. Uh, yeah, it’s a bit worrying. I mean, we are frantically checking the weather reports all the time and checking to see if the cows are standing up – because that’s how you tell in Somerset.

Max: We’ll hear more about the huge challenges facing Sunrise later in the programme. This summer there are hundreds of events to choose from. From here at the O2 Festival in Hyde Park to Scotland, Wales and the West Country.

MAX (commentary): And it’s not just music. Poetry, books – and even science have their own festivals. Over 3 million of us will visit a festival this year.

Richard Cope: If we do a survey amongst all adults something like 45% of all adults have been to some sort of concert or festival within the last 3 years, which is pretty incredible. For festivals, this probably dips down to about sort of 13% of the population, but again, that’s still a pretty sizeable group. I think it’s fair to say it’s a pretty fundamental part of being British really.

Max (commentary): And it’s the feel good factor that attracts the crowds.

Richard: When we talk to consumers the reason they’re going to concerts is cause they crave the atmosphere of a live event. They’d rather spend their money on experiencing something, in this case a concert, than spending their money on home improvement so, it’s more about experience than material goods really

Max (commentary): We spend an average of £400 each for a major festival - and the industry is estimated to be worth a billion pounds. It’s no wonder promoters are competing for a slice of the pie.

Ticket prices is just the beginning of the cost to the festival goer and they’re really expensive. I mean that’s just the start, you’ve got to get there which can be very pricey but once you’re on site, I mean the costs, it’s a bubble, it kind of operates in it’s own economy I mean beers are generally over £3 the food’s very pricey I mean you’re looking at probably minimum £30 each per day

But while the rewards are great, so are the risks. Melvin Benn, organiser of Leeds and Reading, has millions riding on his bank holiday weekend extravaganza

Melvin Benn: we’re all businesses we’ve all got to somehow try and break even at the end of the day, and putting a festival on is very risk intensive, you got to guarantee a lot of money out without being able to be sure that there’s going to be that much coming in.

Max (commentary): A fortune can be lost in a single weekend. As John Giddings, organiser of the Isle of Wight Festival knows only too well.

Max: So what happened in 2003 when it lost money?

John: We lost half a million pounds.

Myleene: What went wrong there?

John: Nothing, we just didn’t sell enough tickets.

Max: So are festivals a good way to make money?

John: …it’s the biggest gamble in the world. You gamble millions of pounds, hoping that people will buy tickets to see the bands you think they want to see. And if you’re lucky you can make money at the end, but it’s a very quick way of losing money if you don’t get it right.

Max (commentary): And now that more and more festivals have started up the market is becoming saturated. Even Glastonbury, the granddaddy of them all, had trouble selling all its tickets this summer.

Paul Sokes: I think a lot of people thought well there’s so many other festivals this summer, let’s watch Glasto on the telly, and we’ll go to the one down the road

Myleene (commentary): Our obsession with festivals goes back for years. The Glyndebourne Opera Festival began in 1934, and the Hay-on-Wye literary festival celebrated its 21^st birthday this year.

But the great pop music festivals of the 60’s and 70’s have become the stuff of legend.

Myleene (commentary): John Giddings was at the third Isle of Wight Festival in 1970.

John: they managed to persuade Jimmy Hendrix, the Doors, the Who, Anderson, Lake and Palmer – you name it, they were there. And they got 600,000 people. 1970 was really the Woodstock of Europe. It was a fantastic event. I went there with my mates from school and we had the best time.

Myleene (commentary): Now many of the survivors from the original festivals are once again hitting the trail.

Richard: this is the first time we’ve had this generation who are traditionally time and cash rich, this is the first time we’ve had a generation in this segment who have grown up with rock and roll, I mean they are that generation.

Myleene (commentary): An ageing, wealthy audience is good news for what the industry calls ‘heritage’ acts. So it’s no accident that Neil Young, the Sex Pistols and even the Police have headlined a festival near you this summer. Just the sort of acts that this audience want to see.

Max (commentary): Forty-something Simon Dunne is one such fan. Simon’s great passion is his family – his wife Joanne, and children Jonny and Amelia. But before them, he had another passion…

Simon: Originally when we came into the house, um, before Amelia was born, I used to have music up here, I used to have a stereo in here, my guitar. And, um, I used it as a bit of a music room. However, instead of this, I now have this!

Max (commentary): Family life might have taken over from music, but Simon is still a punk rocker at heart. And a huge fan of the Sex Pistols.

Simon: Anybody who knows about punk knows about the Sex Pistols, you know and um, you know, Johnny Rotten he’s a genius.

Max (commentary): Simon’s been going to festivals since he was 17 - he’s been to Reading 12 times. So he’s earned his stripes, but he’s worried that maybe he’s getting too old…

Simon: I think the last time I went to Reading, Marilyn Mason headlined with Eminem. And to see the age of people there, Eminem fans – they were like 9 and 10 with their little masks on, and I started to think them, you know, maybe, maybe my festival days are coming to an end because I was becoming aware that I just looked out of place. I mean I was older than some of these guy’s dads!

Max (commentary): The one festival he’s never been to is the Isle of Wight. And the fact the Pistols are headlining means he can’t say no.

Simon: I don’t think I’d be going if the Sex Pistols weren’t playing, but I’ve always wanted to go to the Isle of Wight. You know, to headline a festival is unbelievable really. I just can’t imagine 50,000 people watching the Sex Pistols. It’s going to be awesome.

Max (commentary): Simon has decided he’s going to take advantage of Britain’s most unusual short let market… And stay with Tangerine Fields.

Tangerine Fields was among the first to offer festival goers fuss-free camping. Suzy Myler saw a gap in the market.

Suzy Myler: It was just on the way back from the Big Chill festival 5 years ago we thought there must be an easier way of doing this, so just went back and over a pint sketched together a plan and we came up with the idea of Tangerine Fields.

Max (commentary): The company rents out a tent, airbed and sleeping bag all set up for when you arrive. It seems festival goers are not as hardy as they once were.

Suzy: Since our first year where we had these 50 tents at one festival, we’ve now gown to 24 events, and I think our largest last year was looking at about maybe 2 and half thousand people in one field, and we’re going to pass that this year. It’s getting quite big.

Max (commentary): So big that turnover was a quarter of a million pounds last year.

But competition is stiff. Festival goers can now reside in podpads, yurts, or even luxurious Camp Kerala.

Myleene (commentary): It’s the end of April – a month before doors open and at Sunrise Festival HQ, the mood is tense. They’ve called an emergency finance meeting. Ticket sales are above last year’s level, but they still haven’t broken even.

Sophie: We’re about a month away from the festival now, 4 weeks and ticket sales are going, they’re going really well actually, EDIT… but at this stage it’s really hard to keep the budget under control and it’s kind of sprawling and we need to make sure that it really stays at the level that we need it to be at otherwise it could all fall apart now.

Myleene (commentary): Unless they sell more advance tickets, they’ll have to rely on gate sales. The very thing they were trying to avoid.

Sophie: We want to arrive at the beginning of the festival having met the budget and broken even so we aren’t dependant on weather because if there’s bad weather then we might not make any gate sales.

Myleene (commentary): And we all know the great British summer isn’t reliable.

Successful festivals have two essential ingredients: big headliners and sponsorship. But you need to get the headliners right before anything else.

Something that Legendary promoter Vince Power knew only too well when he came to put on his Hop Farm festival in Kent.

Vince Power: It’s the most important thing you can have, it’s very important I mean Neil Young is the reason we have a sell out there, and is also the reason the other bands, ‘cause he’s a legend, the other bands will be, it’s almost making a statement.

Myleene (commentary): This year, Sunrise has headliners The Orb and The Beat . Not exactly A listers any more. But big names cost big bucks – something Sunrise doesn’t have.

Sophie: Because we’re not a massive budget festival, we have to rely on just getting really good bands with a few headliners, and I think the headliners do sell it to some extent but it’s the experience that people remember

Myleene (commentary): So if they haven’t got big names, what about sponsors to help with the cash flow?

Sophie: We’ve got a strong ethical policy with our sponsorship and we won’t make any kind of arrangements with any organisations that don’t have the same kind of ethical standpoint that we do. We’ve had some offers from people that we’ve turned down because it’s not green enough for us.

Myleene: Sunrise is taking a risk - turning down money that could help it break even.

Max: Most festivals do the opposite, and take on several sponsors.

Melvin: it’s about when you put something on sale what you’re essentially trying to do is put it on sale with the minimum amount of risk and obviously if you’ve got heavy sponsorship, that takes the risk away a little bit. It means you have to sell a few less tickets.

Max (commentary): And that’s true even if it’s not a music festival you’re putting on. The Hay-on-Wye literary festival relies on sponsorship to help pay the bills.

Peter: We have 5% of our budget from the public purse, 70% of our budget from ticket sales, but you know without the money from Sky and Emirates and the Guardian then we’d be stuffed. I mean people sponsor us for different reasons, and that’s actually quite interesting. Sky and the Guardian want content and they are media partners as well as sponsors. Emirates want profile and the branding.

Max (commentary): BT is sponsoring the Isle of Wight festival this year.

Matthew Dearden: I think it’s right for us to be working with a festival that has the breadth of people that the Isle of Wight does. There are other fantastic festivals and many we’d be pleased to be associated with but we find they tend to be a particular niche of people and one of the things which is a great fit between BT and the I of W is we have every type of person going.

Max (commentary): BT won’t reveal how much it’s paying for the privilege, but it’s hoping the association will mean people think of it as more than the company that sends them phone bills.

Matthew: I’m not going to be measuring this by sales volume – that would be ramming it down peoples’ throats on site, which is not what we’re there to do. I want to measure this by saying have people understood the modern brand we are as a company

Max (commentary): The Isle of Wight festival is happy to have BT and other sponsors on board providing they set the right tone.

John: I think people in the modern day don’t mind if they see there’s some fun to be had with it, but if it’s just right in their faces they don’t like it they will walk the other way.

Max (commentary): Too much sponsorship can ruin a festival's vibe. In 2005 Carling pumped £6 million into live music and even had the Reading Festival renamed the Carling Weekend. But this year, Melvin Benn has dropped such full-on plugging.

Melvin: Very simply, I didn’t want it to be called the ‘something something’ Reading festival or the ‘something something’ weekend. I wanted it to be called Reading festival and Leeds festival. That was a lucrative sponsorship, and it was due for renegotiation and yes, it will cost me a fair amount of money, but I think in the long run it was the right thing to do.

Max (commentary): Vince Power thinks the time is right to have a festival that has no branding or sponsorship.

Vince: Sponsorship is not going to stop but I think I will create a niche where people say yeah, I prefer this, I like this, and it’s refreshing now that as you go around the site you’re not going to fall over a brewery sign.

Max (commentary): But he admits there will be financial consequences.

Vince: I’m not going to make as much profit this year, but I’ll make a profit, and I’m doing it because I love it anyway, so you know obviously I have to pay my bills, but it’s a fun thing to do.

Myleene (commentary): It’s a day before the Sunrise festival kicks off, and the site is still under construction. Set up has been delayed because they’ve had the one thing beyond their control. Rain. And lots of it.

Sophie: It rained all day yesterday and it rained all day Monday as well and ‘cause the ground’s kind of clay, it doesn’t drain very well, so. Monday we could handle, thought we’d just weather the storm, and it’d be ok, but when it happened again on Wednesday we’re really, really nervous.

Myleene (commentary): But there’s good news, the council has been to inspect the site and has given it the green light. They’ll be able to open on time. And curiously the wet weather hasn’t deterred festival goers from wanting to buy tickets!

Little Dan: Ticket sales are going fantastic, absolutely brilliantly. I spoke to one of my ticket agents yesterday and he said to several people on the phone when they phoned up, look just hold off til 3 ‘o’clock cause we’re not sure about it going ahead, and the guy on the end of the line said “no no I want to buy my tickets right now”.

But that evening, things deteriorated.

The weather was so severe; the team only had one option. To cancel the festival.

When I last came here this was nothing but a barren field expecting a festival. Now I’m standing where the acts should be headlining in nothing but mud.

Myleene (commentary): Festivals wouldn’t be festivals without mud, and in the sunshine it was easy to put on a pair of Wellingtons and splash around. But the damage had been done.

Myleene: So Sophie what happened?

Sophie: Well since you were last here..

Myleene: It’s too hideous

Sophie: (laugh) it all changed somewhat. We had to officially close the event at about 8.30 last night.

Myleene: That must be heart-breaking, because I saw the queues of people trying to get on site this morning – it was a sell-out.

Sophie: It was – everything was in place. On Monday we were even a day ahead on the build – everything was looking really good – it was going to be a fantastic event – the vibe was great – everyone was really positive about it and unfortunately we had something which was entirely beyond our control – beyond anything we could have really expected as well.

Myleene (commentary): Months of hard work had been washed away in a few hours.

Myleene: I get the impression you’re a little bit shell-shocked by it still.

Sophie: Yes a little bit shell shocked – not really slept and ate enough but at least the sun’s out now and that’ll help people doing what they do.

Myleene (commentary): Sunrise won’t know cost of cancelling the festival for several weeks, but it’s likely to be huge. It’s not clear if there’ll be a next year.

Max (commentary): While Myleene’s drying her Wellies, I’m off to join 55,000 people at the sold out Isle of Wight festival.

It’s midway through and there’s enough sunburn around to show they’ve been blessed by dry weather for the 6th year in a row. Organiser John Giddings is chuffed.

John: It's gone fantastically. The weather has held. One of the surprises was the Sugar Babes in the big top. They had 5,000 people inside and about 5,000 people outside. They'll go on the main stage next year I think.

Max (commentary): The Isle of Wight chamber of commerce estimates the festival brings 10 million pounds to the local community. And on site it's easy to see how. A captive audience means food and drink costs are high, and there’s always merchandise to buy. And queues at the cash machines are longer than for the toilets.

Max: Had a drink, had some chips and gravy, now I've bought the t-shirt and 18 quid lighter.

Max (commentary): Sponsors are all hoping to woo customers. Main sponsor BT is keeping it pretty low key. The advertising in its chill out tent is surprisingly subtle.

Max: But aren't people going to go home saying “that was a great chill out tent”, not realising it was a BT chill out tent 'cos actually the logos in here are tiny. It's very subtle, you wouldn't know it's a BT tent unless you really looked quite hard.

Mathew: There’s plenty of BT logos as you come in, what we didn't want to do is have people feeling they've come into a corporate hot house; this is supposed to be a chill out tent.

Max: So this tent must be expensive I mean how much does it cost to put this on?

Mathew: We don't release the costs but if you look around you'll see we've provided the free calls, the free broadband, magazines, newspapers, we've tried to make it a really good chill out zone.

Max: All expensive though, I mean are you confident you're getting your money back?

Mathew: I think so because over time it helps show people here's a new - new generation growing up with new BT, providing more services than perhaps they realise, and over time that will really work for us we're pleased to provide the service at the festival.

Max (commentary): I caught up with Pistols fan Simon Dunne at his hassle free camp site.

It’s about a thousand degrees in there.

Max: So the air bed was here in the tent was here, all you had to do was get in it and go to sleep?

Simon: Yeah, we got here on Thursday night it was pouring down with rain, so to get to a festival and this is already made for you especially in the rain it was just luxury, just got in, and that was it.

Max (commentary): Luxury that cost 140 pounds for the weekend.

Max: Is this a sign do you think that at forty one you're getting a bit soft?

Simon: Absolutely not.

Max (commentary): We’ll catch up with Simon again after he’s seen the Sex Pistols.

In the meantime, I’ve got an opportunity he’d die for – I’m off backstage to meet John Lydon.

John: This way. Welcome to Chez Rotten.

Max (commentary): The Pistols are on stage in a few hours and we’ve got ten minutes with him in his dressing room.

John: Good. And your name is?

Max: I'm Max. Hello.

John: Hello, Max.

Max (commentary): The Isle of Wight is just one of 20 festivals the Sex Pistols are headlining in Europe this summer.

Max: These tours, they must be pretty lucrative mustn't they?

John: They should be. I mean, the Sex Pistols is a band that's been ripped off royally by this industry, like, right from the, its initial outset. Um, and we like, we like to be paid for what we do because we do deliver the goods. This isn't really about money with us. Not, not at this point in my life or any of their lives .

Max: Are you looking forward to tonight?

John: Uh, amazingly apparently we, we, we outsold this place in record time. Um, I, I.

Max: Are you surprised by that?

John: Yeah, I am really, because it, I mean, looking at it, walking around the site today it's like Butlins isn't it? Right. But it's our Butlins and we'll make it so tonight.

Max (commentary): Next morning - one very hung over fan has come on site early to get a coffee.

Simon: We made our way down to see Iggy and the Stooges about 7:00 or 8:00 and, um, watched them, and then we went down to see the Sex Pistols and I didn't think they were gonna top Iggy and the Stooges, but they absolutely nailed it. Absolutely fantastic.

Max (commentary): And for John Giddings, hiring the Pistols was money well spent.

John:Oh, the highlight. I thought the Pistols, just John Lydon mouthing off to 55,000 people had the best time and anarchy in the UK will go down. It, it was a legendary performance. Definitely that was the highlight.

Myleene (commentary): Back in Somerset, two weeks have passed since Sunrise was called off and Sophie and the team have been calculating the financial damage.

Sophie: It's - it's still kind of being worked out but it's probably kind of fifty thousand pounds extra that was spent on it to keep it-keep it open, which didn't work.

Myleene (commentary): The future of Sunrise now lies in the hands of its ticket holders who have all been offered full refunds…

Sophie: We're hoping it's kind of as much as eighty percent of people will not want a full refund and will actually come to our next event that we're doing now, which is the Sunrise at the Big Chill. Um and if that's the case then it'll all be fine for us. And if it's kind of fifty to eighty percent we'll be ok. If it's less than fifty percent we'll struggle

Myleene (commentary): So Sunrise will be held this year- as part of another festival - the Big Chill.

It’s given them a chance at survival. But what’s the future for others?

Vince: It’s early days and we’re obviously entering into a recession, at least that’s what everybody tells us. So I think there’ll be a lot of festivals that will go under because of lack of sales.

I think the major festivals will survive very strong, the big names will survive, the little ones, they will find it hard to make ends meet.

Max: For small festivals like Sunrise, their future might lie in linking together with other small promoters. And that’s already beginning to happen. The Association of independent festivals was recently established.

Myleene: In the mean time as long as you don’t mind a bit of mud there’s a festival out there with your name on it.

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Content last updated: 30/07/2008

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