Christopher BarrettBorn into a family of events operators, Rupert Bassadone gained his first taste of working on a festival as a nine-year-old. The vast amount of experience he has gained since includes 18 years at WOMAD where he is head of operations. Here, the Ops People MD and founder of Event Site Design reflects on a fascinating career path and looks to 2025 with great optimism.
Rupert Bassadone
What was the first festival you attended and did it have a lasting impact?
I was born into the events world; my parents had a circus, and it would travel to many places including festivals each year. My dad was a builder, and after the circus finished, every year he would work on Glastonbury, so I assumed that everyone was just doing it part time to get away from their real jobs, and that there wasn’t this whole industry involved in it. When my dad informed me that people do it as a career, I said ‘Wow. Okay. Where do I sign up?’.
When did you get your first taste of working on an event?
I was given my first two-way radio at a festival in France when I was nine years old. The festival wasn’t doing very well with ticket sales, so the theatre company I was with realised this and decided to take ownership of the gates to get as much money as they could for themselves, because they were the biggest act there. I ended up becoming a runner for them, and that gave me the bug, it was a good adrenaline rush.
What was your first major role?
It was with WOMAD Festival, and that came about from a family friend knowing the site manager. It was an assistant site production role in 2007, which was one of the wettest years on record. It was a crazy baptism of fire. That year at WOMAD made people and broke people. There was mud everywhere, people were crying, we’d lost buggies in puddles six feet high, and we were using a boat to get down one of the fields. I was told I was unflappable, but I was just ignorant to what normal looked like, and so because of that I got away with it and was asked back. Seventeen years later I’m still there.
What has led you to work at WOMAD for so long. It must be a great event to work on?
I’m always told by the other site crew, and others that work on lots of other big festivals, that WOMAD is very different. I absolutely love it. It’s the ability to be able to plan something that big and see it come to life, but also when stuff doesn’t go well it’s being able to make decisions that really change the path to whether the festival is successful or not.
It’s been a difficult couple of years for many festivals but what excites you most about the year ahead?
We’ve got some great things that we’re quoting on, and there’s obviously some big sporting events on the calendar coming up, so there is a lot of excitement. A lot of festivals have closed recently, and while that is really sad to see it means the industry isn’t as saturated. The reality is, that some of the events that can’t continue are the ones that shouldn’t be continuing. Ultimately, there will be less of them, and that’s only going to help those that remain. The clients that we’re working with are saying ticket sales are looking really, really, strong. There’s a couple of festivals that we work with that are saying that ticket sales are up by around 400% year-on-year, and they’ve sold more tickets already than they had by the time of the last actual festival. Meanwhile, stadium events are looking really good in terms of ticket sales so far. There still seems to be a lot of positivity and confidence in the outdoor events market.
Who has been the most influential in helping you build your career?
It is really hard to pick one, because there are a few people that have given me opportunities, and so it’s been a butterfly effect; one person leads to another who leads to another. My dad was a huge influence and the reason I got into events. He asked Tim Roberts from The Event Safety Shop to help. Despite being an incredibly busy man, Tim sat me down, told me to do an NEBOSH course, and opened up his black book of contacts. I sent out around 80 letters and emails, and one of the few who responded was Neil Levene, who now heads up CarFest but back then was with Brand Events. He rung me and said, ‘I’ve got an event next week, come and join us as a member of the site crew at Regents Park for an event called Toast’. From that, I ended up doing Top Gear Live and many more, and meeting [International Select Events owner] Tim Filmer, who then gave me loads of safety work. It all really started with Tim Roberts.
If there was one thing about the events industry you could change, what would it be?
There’s this perception that there’s a difference between a buyer and a supplier. The reality is that we are all event professionals, and we are all trying to put on a good show, whether you’re putting in toilets and providing toilet roll or you’re the production company that’s working on behalf of the promoter. I’ve got two companies, an event production company and events design company, so the latter is a supplier. I feel uneasy with that separation because I don’t think the balance is fair in the way it’s defined within industry at the moment. That is a big thing that I would love to see changed.
What’s your favourite way to unwind?
Golf is my outright pleasure. Considering the amount I play at the moment; I should be much better than I am. Golf allows me to not have to think about anything else. I love it, even though it can be awfully frustrating. I urge everyone not to do it.