Event suppliers in Western Australia are under huge financial stress following a series of failed events.
Cassandra Brennan, president of the Events Industry Association of WA (EIA), told scenestr, “the events industry in Western Australia has been struggling for some years following the downturn in the resources industry and ticket sales falling off due to a number of reasons.
“Several events in the last six months have hit the same suppliers and as a result the EIA is working closely with the state government to develop a set of protocols to protect suppliers who work on state government-sponsored events. We work for our members first but also the whole industry.”
She told The West Australian ”I’ve spoken to one guy who has had to sell his house, another guy who has had to borrow money from his family and several who are facing going bankrupt because they simply cannot continue."
Southbound Festival, which featured almost 70 high-profile Australian artists asked creditors to accept less than 100c in the dollar following December’s event which experienced poor ticket sales which in turn compounded the strain caused by the total cancellation of the 2015/16 event due to the severe fires in Western Australia. At the time, Southbound director, David Chitty said, "Everyone is absolutely devastated as we were working so hard to bring the best Southbound yet.”
Related: Southbound Fire Fundraiser
Perhaps the first signs of distress in WA appeared in 2014 when Soundwave promoter AJ Maddah said keeping the Perth leg of the Soundwave festival would have meant “losing the festival altogether as it had become financially unviable.”
It’s not only WA that is immune. In the past few years the promoters of Winterbeatz, and Soulfest have cost artists, suppliers and ticket holders millions of dollars in unpaid debts.
