Its Official! UK Live Outdoor Events Get the Go-Ahead from 11th July 2020.

After four months of lockdown and a ban on all live events where crowds can gather the UK Government finally announced on 9th July that ‘outdoor’ live events with an audience can go ahead from 11th July 2020. Just how prepared is the industry for this and what restrictions will there be?   

Given the suddenness of the announcement from the Culture Secretary, Oliver Dowden, that outdoor live events can resume from Saturday 11th July how prepared are events organisers to get their events up and running? Hopefully many organisers have spent the last 4 months preparing for a potential reopening so it should not be too difficult to arrange an outdoor event quickly. For the live music events sector this will probably depend on how quickly they can confirm artists and organise logistics around an event. For those that are well prepared this could be achieved within a week or so and with so much pent up demand they could well be sold out quickly. 

For any event organiser thinking of getting an outdoor live event up and running there will surely be restrictive conditions that will apply. Although the government announcement mentions these there appear to be no specific details published as yet. However, it is safe to assume that the following restrictions will likely be mandatory:

• Reduced audience size to allow for the required social distancing measures.
• Ticket sales to be made online or electronically and all on-site purchases to be cashless.
• Drinks and food servicing to avoid customer queues.
• Health and safety measures with temperature checks, customer registration, provision of hand wash sanitiser plus regular cleaning and sanitisation of common use facilities like bathrooms.
  

There has yet to an announcement of how these measures will be monitored and enforced but event organisers will need make necessary plans to enable compliance. For sure this will impact on resources, additional staff and expenditure on cleaning facilities and distanced seating plans for example will increase costs. Added to this will be the reduced audience size that will result in lower ticket sales revenue so there will need to be some serious number crunching required to figure out if it is even financially viable to currently hold an outdoor event.

Whilst the announcement is welcome news the potential restrictions could financially hamper some event organisers from running an event. This needs to be balanced with the need to get back in business and the companies running live events should learn to adapt and improve efficiencies to make live events work financially. Events companies can get geared up for these new restrictions partly by using technology specifically for ticketing and cashless payments. Even food and drink ordering can be done using mobile apps for example further reducing serving staff contact. 

Using an events management software solution like FestivalPro can make your events business more efficient saving you money and time in planning and delivering your live events. 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 great functionality allowing event organisers to manage electronic and cashless payments online and on-site. 

Photo by Sascha Hormel from Pexels

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