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Planning Music Festival On-site Accommodation.

Andy Robertson

Any music festival that attracts a sizable audience and is spread over several days will have to provide accommodation. This could vary between a field for camping to five-star luxury accommodation. How this works in practice will depend every much on the audience dynamics and their budgets. 


As well as providing space for festival goers to sleep having a variety of accommodation available can also generate an additional revenue streams and will be essential if organisers are offering VIP packages. 

Providing a field for camping sounds simple but requires some thought and planning to go into setting this up. Primary considerations are to provide an area that is free from flooding along with ease of access for health and safety compliance and a robust infrastructure of bathroom facilities plus availability of first aid posts and marshals for example.

Most festival organisers will offer a range of accommodation over and above the standard campsite. It’s common to see the usual array of tepees and yurts which really are a little passe these days. In deciding which options to consider organisers should understand their audience demographics and typical budgets based on their experience form previous events. Well before the festival dates organisers should decide on the accommodation mix having contacted suppliers and obtained availability and all associated costs.

Typical set up may include luxury tent suites, sometimes called pop-up hotels and although large and furnished to a high standard they are perhaps just glorified tents? They are however very easy to transport and set up.  Gypsy wagons and mobile homes offer something a little different and are of a more solid construction but can get expensive and the logistics in delivery and set up could present issues where access to large delivery transport is problematic. Flat pack wooden chalets have become more popular in recent years because they are easy to transport and erect. Once constructed they provide something with a sturdy construction over a fabric tent.

Also gaining in popularity are converted shipping containers. If large numbers are used the facilities could start to resemble a small city block. The containers are stackable making for relatively easy installation as the containers come pre-furnished and offer the ultimate in plug and play accommodation. As with any pre-built structure the practicality of using shipping containers will depend on ease of access to the site and if stacking will require some heavy-duty lifting equipment too.

Whatever accommodation mix a music festival organiser decides on it should match audience expectations in terms of cost and practicality. Differentiating a festival by providing more innovative accommodation will also set the event apart from the competition and provide additional revenue streams. 

Using an events software management platform like FestivalPro festival organisers get all the functionality they need to manage accommodation logistics as well as ticketing capabilities to manage a wide variety of accommodation options to customers. The guys who are responsible for this software have been in the front line of event management for many years and the features are built from that experience and are performance artists themselves. The FestivalPro platform is easy to use and has comprehensive features for scheduling deliveries with dynamic calendars. The wide range of ticketing features allow for most accommodation pricing scenarios to be offered via the festival website and social media.  

Photo by David McBee from Pexels

Andy Robertson
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