The director of a Cumbrian festival has made a plea for support – and said its organisation has nearly killed him.
Dave Crossley, director of Ulverston’s Another Fine Fest, said organising the 2024 event – its 10th anniversary – had been the toughest one yet.
The free multi-arts festival, which takes place between June 14 and June 16, is in homage to Stan Laurel, who was born in the town.
Dave said: “We’ve been working day and night for many months to produce our free, twice-world record breaking, two-day festival in the town where I was born and in the town which I adore, to celebrate Ulverston, promote a vast spectrum of music and the arts so at least something connects with each and every person, young and old and whatever your ability, create work for lots of local businesses and paid work for a large number of musical acts, artists and workshop leaders.”
It costs over £50,000 to put on – and Dave said it had been made possible by fundraising, grants and donations from individuals and local organisations.
He said: “This year 823 amazing people – approximately 5% of our predicted 20,000 attendees – generated £19,590. This equates to an average donation of £23.80.
“The dream would be that everyone who enjoys our free fest could give just £2 or £3. This would make my life infinitely easier and help to secure the future of the event.
“Thankfully though, I was able to secure the support of 30-plus local businesses including seven venues/arts organisations throughout Cumbria as well as a vegan craft ale bar in Barcelona, who either sponsored us or took adverts in our official programme.
“But still, on top of this, yet more needs to be done. This thing only survives from generating multiple streams of funding. Throughout the year one of the essential components of fundraising is applying for grants. This can be a very intense and time consuming process with literally no guarantee of success.”
He said he applied for several grants and two were successful – with the festival receiving £2,000 from Ulverston Town Council and £800 from CGP.
Dave added: “But still that is not enough to create an event of this size – so then it’s onto trader pitches – whilst our wonderful traders are an awesome attraction in their own right – they provide another vital income stream needed to make this event happen.
“This process involves me having to conduct a lengthy search for suitable high quality vendors and approach a large number of them in order to be able to book enough to fill the streets, add to the vibes and generate another few thousand for the festival kitty.
“Add to this, multiple fundraising raffles, events and merch sales and last but certainly not least are our brilliant partner venues who I liaise with and bring into the mix. I’ve managed to sign up a couple extra this year which is great as we now have 10!
“They will all chip into the festival pot, as well as pay for acts or awesome local promoters to organise and pay for acts to perform in their venues.
“This partner venue ‘buy-in’ helps to boost our overall line up as in return we then include them in our larger festival programme. This adds around 100 acts to the mix.
“Again, all hugely appreciated and we hope that these official venues find this to be an investment with thousands of people collectively, drinking in their venues throughout the weekend! The door is always open for any other establishments.”
“All of this brilliant support above has allowed me to book and pay for; multiple stage managers, hosts and helpers, a health and safety officer, a first aid team including paramedics, a large scale security team to look after all of our outdoor stage areas and beyond, 20 world class visual artists who I will pair with multiple outlets throughout town to paint their windows as well as temporary art zones and permanent sites, the wood and materials and joiners to create the temp zones, all the insurances, the licences, the toilets, the waste management, all the staging, the sound systems and technicians and a variety other infrastructure and decor, a widespread marketing campaign including photographers, videographers and editors, posters, flyers, banners, sponsored posts on social networks, web design and hosting, hosting for the online programme and the printing of 20,000 tabloid sized newspaper programmes, absolutely not forgetting the absolute workhorse graphic designer Craig Troth who works his socks off alongside me to create it, with me throwing him endless amount of information and imagery for weeks on end!
“It has also enabled me to book around 38 acts from the worlds of music, magic, circus and much more. It has given me the ability to snag 10 of the very best stand up comedy acts as seen ont telly, who will give previews of their upcoming Edinburgh Fringe shows over the weekend in the Laurel and Hardy Museum.
“Add to this – multiple, free interactive workshops for all, hosted by very skilled workshop leaders and many wonderful walkabout and street theatre acts as seen at festivals such as Glastonbury who will bring joy to the streets.
“And we’ve now teamed up with MIND and Beaumont college to create a chill out zone with a programme of relaxing activities, in order to make our event even more accessible for all.
“We’ve had several people this year ask questions like, why on earth after 10 years are you not standing on your own two feet, why are you always struggling for cash.
“It’s because we are a massive free event where everyone gets paid, that’s trying to do something different and something special for this town, during a cost of living crisis where costs have spiralled, where funding is ever harder to come by, where Arts Council funding in particular has been slashed to the bone by central government, where local council funding has been similarly slashed, meaning that services that were previously supplied to the festival free of charge in return for us bringing massive amounts of people into the area, are possibly now going to cost us lots of money, where we unsuccessfully request support from a multi-national corporation who generated billions of pounds in a cost of living crisis but couldn’t even give one pound to a festival which makes them significant profit during the event, where we face more scrutiny than ever as a festival and must fulfil more obligations than in previous years – all this hoop jumping is also very expensive etc etc etc etc.
“Hopefully we’ll make tons of money for two absolutely amazing local charitable organisations St Mary’s Hospice and Ulverston Food Project whilst we’re at it and put smiles on tens of thousands of faces.”
He urged people to attend the festival, have a great time and support it by buying a drink or two or donating to it via the QR code on the front of the programme.
