Four event management lessons to take from the Fyre Festival disaster
If you haven’t been following the Fyre Festival disaster, brace yourself. As far as event management horror stories go, this is just about as bad as it gets. Fyre Festival – brainchild of rapper Ja Rule and tech entrepreneur Billy McFarland – was touted as a high-end luxury music festival taking place on an exquisite, supermodel-riddled island in the Bahamas. Headliner acts included the likes of Blink-182 and guests were promised gourmet catering, upmarket accommodation, and a long list of luxury VIP bells and whistles. Tickets to the event ranged from $1,200 to a whopping $250,000 for uber-luxurious villa packages.
But what was supposed to be a lavish weekend in paradise turned out to be a chaotic nightmare that left disgruntled festival-goers stranded on the island, some without any accommodation, after the festival was cancelled in the early hours of the second day. Upon arrival, instead of the plush villas and foodie delights they were promised, shocked attendees were greeted with tents containing wet mattresses and soggy blankets, and mass-produced cheese sandwiches in styrofoam boxes. It soon became clear that none of the infrastructure needed to pull off the event was in place.
The livid guests have since been promised a full refund, or – perhaps laughably – VIP tickets to Fyre Festival 2018. However, the nightmare doesn’t end there. The organisers of Fyre Festival now face multiple class-action lawsuits accusing them of everything from negligence to fraud and breach of contract.
It’s smart to learn from your mistakes, and even smarter to learn from others’ mistakes. So, here are four valuable event management lessons to take from the Fyre Festival debacle:
1) Build excellent relationships with vendors and suppliers
Even before Fyre Festival kicked off, there were rumours of unrest brewing behind the scenes. Most notably, artists were complaining that they hadn’t been paid yet as per their contracts. After getting wind of the deplorable situation on the ground, Blink-182 announced their decision to pull out of the event the day before it was scheduled to begin.
As an event organiser, maintaining good relationships with your vendors and suppliers should be of the utmost importance. It should go without saying, but this means honouring vendor agreements and contracts to the letter. Over and above this, the best event planners go out of their way to nurture trust and goodwill in vendor relationships, as this makes it less likely that they will let you down at the last minute. What’s more, when things on the ground do go wrong, well-treated vendors are more likely to go the extra mile to help you put a back-up plan in place that will salvage your event.
2) Have an emergency back-up plan
Speaking of back-up plans, you need to have a thorough emergency back-up plan in place. When things fell apart at Fyre Festival, event attendees reported a state of total chaos with no-one in charge. No-one had any idea what to do next. Due to the island’s remote location, getting guests back home after the event had been officially cancelled proved tricky in itself, leaving many people stranded at the airport. Running a successful event requires having a detailed plan and an equally detailed back-up plan in place. Never assume that everything will go off without a hitch; plan for every aspect of the event to fail, so that if it does, you’re ready to implement Plan B.
3) Get the basics in place before you start promoting your event
Event management experts weighed in on the Fyre Festival fiasco in this article in Rolling Stone, pointing out that the organisers of the doomed festival went about planning the event in a fatal back-to-front manner. Instead of making sure that the venue could actually support an event of this magnitude and getting a firm handle on the logistical requirements, organisers started promoting the event and selling tickets before doing any groundwork at all. The result? A much-hyped, luxury event that simply didn’t exist.
4) Call in the professionals
In an attempt to explain what went wrong, Fyre Festival organiser Billy McFarland said, “Our mistake was trying to own all of it in-house,” and, “We were in over our heads.” Never underestimate the challenges associated with pulling off a smooth, successful event. Even planning and executing a much smaller event, like a cocktail function, requires expertise and experience. If in doubt, hire a professional event management company to expertly handle the catering, entertainment, seating, lighting, decor, guest list, vendor contracts, and so on.
Don’t leave the success of your events to chance. Avoid a disaster by partnering with a professional event management company that boasts a sterling track record. With over 20 years of experience, TS&A Events offer professional event planning and management services, including project management, conferences, roadshows, corporate events, gala dinners, technical support, video production, and more.
Contact us to chat about your event planning and management requirements.
