Burning Man Opens Up The Books

Costs are high and rewards are higher for the team that produces the large-scale music and art festival Burning Man. Once a year tens of thousands of patrons flock to the Black Rock Desert in Nevada where they make up Black Rock City. This year Burning Man will be held on August 26^th-September 2, 2013. Burning Man prides itself on being dedicated to the community, art, self-expression, and self-reliance. This isn’t the traditional music festival in the least bit, the team describes the festival as more of a city, wherein almost everything that takes place is created entirely by its inhabitants. Unlike other festival productions, Burning Man publishes their comprehensive financial statements as part of their annual “AfterBurn Reports” pictured below.

The statement above reflects the year-round expenditures of the managing corporation. Outside services, facilities rent, travel, office/computer supplies, utilities for the San Francisco and Nevada offices, donations to local Nevada schools/organizations, postage, shipping/freight, gifts/promotions are all important factors to take into account when composing a financial statement. Who knew telephone charges could be so costly? Reading this kind of information and interpreting it to one’s own understanding comes from being financially literate. In today’s market in any sector it is critical to be financially literate. What is particularly interesting about this financial statement is that it includes the specific donations to local Nevada schools and organizations, $222,000 dollars is a lot of money the schools can benefit from. Having an easily accessible financial report from a music festival is gold to graduate students trying to conduct research for a niche market. Factors in the statement reflect 2011’s numbers because their 2012 statements have not been posted yet officially. The next section of the statement focuses on expense categories that include both event-related and organizational items. Tax and licenses, payroll, outside services, insurance, and meals/food are documented carefully and can show future producers and budgeters what trends in festival cost to look out for.

Festival Scene Financially Here To Stay

In the entertainment business, music industries still fight the good fight when it comes to ticket sales and the constant battle against digital revolution and illegal downloads. CBS News reports that U.S. consumers access between $7-$20 million dollars worth of digitally pirated music annually. With all the Internet file sharing and downloading, what are record companies and concerned artists supposed to do to raise revenue and see their intellectual property gain profit? The answer is simple and a course of action that most have taken arms to already…live music festivals. The summer of 2012 demonstrated over 500 music festivals that took place nationwide for every genre of music imaginable according to CBSNEWS.com. Some of the most popular genres breaking through the spectrum include electronic music, electronic dance music (EDM), dubstep, and folk music. The festival scene is here to stay in other words. Festival patrons like myself travel far and wide to enjoy the experience and entertainment that can only be accessed through festivals like Bonnaroo, Ultra, Coachella, Electric Forest, and SXSW. The festival scene is more than just a scene, it’s a revenue tank. Everyone from the festival coordinators to the food vendors on site earn a piece of the proverbial festival pie. 

Concert ticket sales tripled from $1.5 billion to $4.6 billion between 1999 and 2009, not bad for a ten-year span where music was evolving like never before. Diversity and availability is key in this business. Make wide ranges of music available live all over the country and sit back and watch the masses flock to it. Even in tough economic times, publics still splurge on live entertainment because the experience is irreplaceable. 500 music festivals in one summer session seems expansive and risky, but was exactly what this country needed for a little kick-start for what is to come in the future. Launching new music festivals is a huge risk, and every team’s contribution to projects like this has to count. But what is so great about launching new projects and events like this is how many jobs it creates. Positions like festival promoters, and online social media managers are created to help grow and expand awareness of the upcoming festivals. Live music can save the morale of the people and the pockets of the music industry easily.