Reducing Music Festival Costs Using Tickets as Currency.

One of the biggest challenges this year for music festival organisers are the rising costs for everything associated with putting on their event. Despite good financial planning some costs continue to increase. Organisers could consider using their tickets as an asset currency to help reduce expenditure.

Most festival organisers will allocate a proportion of their tickets as gratis for friends and family plus those agreed in the accreditation process. The penalty for doing this is potential lost ticket sales revenue but for a large festival this makes up only a small percentage of overall revenue. The ticketing estimates can be altered to move a higher number into the accreditation system and used as a substitute currency to help reduce costs.

Suppliers. 
Whether it’s the supply of security fencing, stages, the backline, waste management services or power generation every supplier has traditionally received a handful of passes with access to specified zones and days. It is the increased costs from these suppliers that are hitting festival organisers hard but with some negotiation it may be possible to agree discounts in exchange for being giving a number of event access tickets against a reduced invoice value.

Contract Freelance Staff.
The music festival sector relies heavily on seasonal freelance contract workers to perform certain duties for organisers which may include graphic designers, marketing personnel, volunteer managers and artist liaison managers for example. These individuals may be open to a reduction in invoice amounts if they are offered several event tickets or VIP passes in exchange which they can pass onto their own family and friends.

Ticket Ambassadors Schemes. 
Many festival organisations have ticket ambassador schemes where individuals sell tickets in exchange for a commission. An ambassador scheme can be expanded to suppliers and contract staff but with favourable rates or on a completely gratis basis. This enables them to convert the face value of tickets into cash for the services they have provided and it gives them an alternative if they prioritise funds over event attendance.

Any large multi-day music festival can have ticket face values in excess of $500 and in some cases many times that for VIP tickets and packages. This face value can be used to negotiate financial discounts on services provided and gives organisers a mechanism to reduce costs without requiring immediate access to cash. For organisers considering this route of bartering a calculation needs to be made to estimate the potential impact on ticket sales revenue. Event organisers have used similar bartering systems for years but now may be the time to consider increasing and expanding this activity to reduce costs in a challenging economic environment.

For festival organisers planning their events using a software management platform like Festival Pro gives them all the functionality they need manage every aspect of their event logistics. 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 Festival Pro platform is easy to use and has comprehensive features with specific modules for managing artists, contractors, venues/stages, vendors, volunteers, sponsors, guestlists, ticketing, cashless payments and contactless ordering.

Photo by Wolfgang via Pexels

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