Christopher BarrettParklife festival (cap. 80,000) and Warehouse Project (10,000) co-founder Sacha Lord has told Access that despite soaring supply chain costs, the decision was made to cut ticket prices for Parklife’s 2024 edition in response to the impact the cost-of-living crisis is having on consumers.
Interviewed for the forthcoming edition of AAA Backstage podcast at the Warehouse Project in Manchester, Lord said it was not feasible to raise Parklife 2024’s ticket prices in line with inflation.
“If we put our prices up by eight or nine per cent, people would be jumping all over us, and it would be the wrong thing to do during the cost-of-living crisis,” said Lord.
Tickets for the 8-9 June 2024, LN Gaiety-owned, event at Manchester’s Heaton Park are priced £125, down from the £129.50 charged for last year’s Parklife.
Lord said he is “extremely confident” about the future of Parklike, and the ticket price cut had been made despite escalating supply chain costs: “[Rising] costs is a huge issue, especially labour intensive companies such as cleaners and security; they have had to put their prices up. I totally understand it, but it comes to a point where it’s unviable. Which I believe is part of the reason why the likes of Bluedot are not running next year.”
Parklife’s promoters have announced that Fisher and Chris Lake will bring their Under Construction show to the festival next year, the first time it has been presented outside the US, but Lord said talent booking for 2024 is not proving easy.
“It doesn’t feel as if there’s that much talent around,” he said. “When you’re booking the headline artists for festivals you’re not just competing with UK festivals, you’re dealing with global festivals. When things aren’t great in the UK, you can earn more money as an artist in Europe or in the States or Mexico.”
