Steve Heap, the retiring General Secretary of AFO, and FastForward have announced the launch of a new research project, funded by EIF and The Purple Guide, aimed at all public festivals in England, Wales and Scotland involving music. This research will help understand the challenges facing all festivals as well as determine the current number of festivals involving music which take place in the UK every year. Led by Steve and curated by FastForward, the snapshot will better understand the festival landscape, including the smaller and niche festivals, not just the major players, any UK festival can take part in the survey.
“We are excited to get this important research live and reach as many festivals as possible. It is very important to us that we understand and represent all of the UK festival scene with links to music if we possibly can. We appreciate there are festivals who are not members of trade bodies, and so would ask you to spread the word and copy this Survey across to as many festivals as you can. To forward this on would help us reach them and encourage them to engage with the research because it will benefit the whole sector. The value of this data will be evident in our lobbying going forward, and future conversations with government at all levels,” says Steve Heap, the retiring General Secretary of the Association of Festival Organisers.
The insight will allow UK festival trade bodies to:
•Better understand and represent the festival industry.•Create a blueprint which can be repeated in the future to keep the research data both accurate and timely.
•Talk to existing trade body members and discover the hard-to-reach festivals.
• Deliver a genuine, full set of data to governments at all levels so that they may find the way to support this major industry in the UK economy.
Chris Carey, founder of Fast Forward, added: “We are delighted to partner with the festival industry on this research and very pleased to be trusted with this important piece of work. Festivals provide an incredible escape for the British public as well as guests from overseas and we are excited to demonstrate the depth and breadth of the impact which they have for fans and the local communities.”
The research report will be made available in late May and to request more information please contact sh@mrscasey.co.uk or Chris Carey chris@ffwd.events
To complete the survey, CLICK HERE
