Abstract

The most famous place for international music festivals in Austria is

Due to my general interest in event management I decided to do my

Music festivals are special events, which can give a great experience

Furthermore I wanted to go into detail of the indirect profitability. The

The Wiesen Festival & Concert Veranstaltungs GMBH provides

Nevertheless, no event passes by without any crisis. The reader

This diploma is focused on the positive consumer satisfaction which is

Studies are done on the organizational methods, the customers feedback and the different service providers. The primary research is based on interviews with members of the

The secondary research consisted of information from special event books, magazines and the Internet.

The purpose of this thesis was to get a better view of creating a music

Table Of Contents

ABSTRACT   III

TABLE OF  CONTENT  V

TABLE OF  FIGURERS  VIII

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT   IX

CHAPTER 1  - INTRODUCTION  1

1.1.  Problem statement  1

1.2.  Significance of study  2

1.3.  Methodology  3

1.4.  Review of literature  3

CHAPTER 2  - OVEREVIEW OF A FESTIVAL  4

2.1.  Definition of an event and festival tourism  4

2.2.  The importance and complexity of a music festival  6

2.3.  The effects of an event  8

2.3.1.  Events are influencing the social and cultural life  8

2.3.2.  Events and the environmental impact  9

2.3.3.  Events and their sphere on tourism and economic  10

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4.2.1. Culture sponsoring…….. ………………………………………. 50

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4.2.2. Sponsoring in Austria ………………………………………….. 52 4.2.3. Sponsoring in Wiesen ………………………………………..... 57

5.7.1. The Jazz Festival’s target group vs.

CHAPTER 7 - THE FESTIVALS INFRASTRUCTURE WITH ITS BEST OUTCOME ………………………………... 103

7.3. Accommodation ………………………………………………………107 7.4. Sanitary equipment …………………………………………………..113 7.5. Catering inside the festival ………………………………………….115 7.6. Medical aid and safety ………………………………………………118 7.7. The infrastructure outside the festival ……………………………120 7.8. Waste Management …………………………………………………..122 CHAPTER 8 - THE CUSTOMER AND THE ARTIST AS THE FESTIVAL MAIN ATTRACTION ……………………. 125

Organizing an event or a festival can be quite an experience as hidden risks and obvious risks are likely to turn the event into an adventure.

An event or festival always features live performances, which means that the organizers can’t revise the performing acts in order to get it done properly.

Therefore, if an event is not correctly planned with reaching objects, staff planning, time planning, etc the organizers will fail badly.

Festivals in particular have a great influence on their surrounding. Due to the large number of people and the noise,

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which is created, it affects the people as well as the infrastructure outside the venue.

Consequently the neighbouring environment has to be involved, with the purpose of achieving the best outcome for all parties concerned.

Masses of people also increase dangerous risks for the organization itself. Alcohol and narrow places are the basis for chaos. The management has to be prepared for the worst and must also have to have alternative solutions at hand before the event starts. 1.2. Significance of the Study The reason why this study is done is because the author wants to show in what way events and festivals in particular are done. The study should give readers an overview on certain steps. It should also give hints on upcoming problems and how to avoid them.

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1.3. Methodology

This study is underlined by interviews with people from the music festival industry, magazines, sponsor companies and public transport organizations.

Particularly, subjects such as sponsoring, marketing, the target customer and the artists needs are based on interviews and information provided by the Wiesen Festival und Veranstaltungs GmbH.

Other chapters include statements made by journalists, public transport employees and other companies involved, which highlight certain statements.

1.4. Review of Literature

As a secondary research method special event management books have been used as a basis for this work.

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Furthermore the internet as well as certain magazines were used in order to compare different announcements, articles and to provide a better understanding of the event management industry.

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2.1. Definition of events and music festivals

An event is defined as anything that happens. It can range from local village events to international spectacles featuring participants from around the world. There are a wide variety of events, such as trade exhibitions, carnivals, sport competitions, street parties and music festivals. Therefore it is important to recognize the diversity and treat each event differently. Every event has its own characteristics and requirements, which have to be met. A special event recognises a unique moment in time with ceremony and ritual to satisfy needs. (Goldblatt)

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2.2. The Importance and Complexity of a

Music Festival

A special event for instance is a music festival. All over the world millions of people are coming together for music festivals. Their main motivation is the music itself. From one to twelve bands are presented on one single day. Furthermore, the experience itself is worth attending such an event. In this atmosphere a special sense of closeness is created as people visit the concerts together. People share emotions and common styles. On the camping sites, visitors build their own tents next to each other. They eat, chat, and celebrate with their neighbours. Often people do not even watch the actual festival acts, because they just want to spend a nice time at the camping site with their friends. Apart from visitors, also record companies and musicians have recognised that festivals open great possibilities. First of all it is a way to present the music. Famous bands often use such an event for presenting their new albums, whereby artists who are not well known have the possibility to introduce themselves.

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Secondly, for groups it is always a challenge to play live on stage because they can see the audience’s reaction right away. Feedback can range from a big applause to a big laugh. Performing on at a festival is even more difficult because of the mixed audiences the artists meet. The festival might have a theme, which represents one direction of music. Nevertheless there are so many differences and the performers have to be aware of the diversity of tastes. The motivation for organizers depends on whether they are profit or non-profit operations. This thesis is pointing out at a profit run organization, thus the motive is to gain profit. To make such an event happen many points have to be considered, as e.g. funding. The amount, which is needed, depends drastically on the nature of the occasion, as well on media attention, media provision or sponsorship. The complexity of the event is influencing the amount of time, personnel and commitment required. The bigger, the more money, people or technical support is required in order to fulfil the event’s needs.

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2.3. Some general positive and negative

impacts of an event

2.3.1. Events are influencing the social and

cultural life

As mentioned above, a festival is a way of sharing experiences, which leads to a stronger community feeling. Being in a community gives people a feeling of pride and increases their actual participation in an event. Furthermore, a festival expands the cultural perspectives.

On a music festival, such as the Chiemsee Reggae Festival or the Chemnitz Sunsplash Festival, multicultural communities come together. People have the chance to a cultural exchange, which increases their mutual understanding. People show that living together peacefully is possible. Events have the power to challenge imaginations and explore possibilities.

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At the same time, negative impacts of an event can influence social and cultural life. An event is used to convey a message. The better it is presented the higher is the appreciation for the product. The best examples are events related to elections. Especially a few weeks prior to an election, the parties want to reach the greatest attention in order to get their votes. It is a fight where manipulation is used to win the crowds over. Substance abuse is another negative impact, which is common for many festivals. Drinking alcohol is part of many cultures and especially on celebrations the flow of alcohol is hardly under control. It leads to a bad behaviour because people loose the feeling of right and wrong. As a result a negative community image is created.

2.3.2. Events and the environmental impact

Nowadays it is globally common to ‘go green’, which means, more and more people are increasingly conscious about the environment.

Festivals attract a wide range of people; some of them are ‘thinking green’ and some of them do not care about anything.

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Therefore a festival can help to increase the environmental awareness.

Being a model in e.g. waste separation can lead to an acceptance of this habit. Such strategies are lowering the negative impacts of environmental damage and pollution, which is increased when more people are coming together for one purpose.

A festival means traffic congestion because thousands of people are travelling there by car. For that reason many festival providers try to improve the transportation infrastructure to avoid traffic jams and pollution. Besides it leads to a diminishing of noise disturbance, which is another negative impact. 2.3.3. Events and the sphere on tourism and

economic

The advantage of event tourism is that it attracts visitors coming to places where rare tourism exists. The economic benefit derives from visitors using facilities, which would otherwise be under-utilised. Hotel rooms will be booked, restaurants will be visited and other facilities, such as food and beverage shops will be used as well. Furthermore a festival creates new jobs within and outside the event. Accommodation,

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transport, food and beverage outlets need to increase their staff in order to fulfil the customers’ needs during the time of the event. Events can provide newness, freshness and change, which sustain local interest in a destination and enhance its appeal to visitors. As mentioned above, a festival is a great possibility to increase the awareness of the existence of a village, such as e.g. Wiesen. As soon as the first festival visitor arrives, high season starts for the village.

If they like it or not, they are part of the festival. Visitors automatically create an image of the village. This chance could be used to make this place attractive enough to gain repeat customers, not just for the festival. The tactic of increasing interest through implementing events is used all over the world. A festival can be used as a marketing strategy for stakeholders. A company might develop a new image through this event. A city or village is able to make itself more attractive because of the land, which is provided. The local festivals can strengthen the local tourism image and create a new cultural image of the city or village.

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The negative side of concentrating too much on tourism is, that the community might watch resistance of tourism because they loose their authenticity. Furthermore, it could be an exploitation of the community. In this case the local way of living is presented as an attraction. Organizers use the locals’ good will as an advantage without giving them anything in return. In addition, prices are inflated in order to achieve good revenues. The host community has to pay increased prices for several things just because tourists tend to accept them and pay higher prices as usual.

All in all, event organizers have to be aware of the Ying Yang effect. The positive sides do not exist without the negative ones. How it works out in the special case of the Wiesen Festivals will be shown in detail in several chapters.

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2.4. Wiesen - the first Festival Place in

Austria

Austria is known as a place full of mountains, Dirndln and Leather trousers. Many tourists come to enjoy classical and traditional concerts but many others come to take part in the Wiesen Music Festivals.

Wiesen is located in Burgenland and it is known for being the place for strawberries in Austria. Around 2779 people live on 1891 ha. Although, Wiesen is also known for hiking and cycling it is more famous for the festivals, which take place every year for about three months.

The first Jazz Festival took place in the 1979 in the old sports- arena in Wiesen. The initiator of this event was Mr. Franz Bogner. In 1980 he decided to buy the Wiesen Festival ground and one year later the first festival took place there. The next step was building a new tent, which was done in 1989. It was especially designed to meet the needs of a music festival, such as optimising the acoustics or presenting the best

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view to the stage. The tent is a unique construction of steal ropes, which also makes it an imposing scenery sight. Figure 1: Wiesen festival tent bird view

Source: www.wiesen.at

In 1993, Mr. Bogner, who originally ran a one-man business, changed his business into Bogner Veranstaltungs GesmbH. This again was sub-divided into the Wiesen Festival & Concerts Veranstaltungs GmbH in 2001. The Wiesen Festival & Concerts Veranstaltungs GmbH became part of the MC Marketing group. They have a 51 % stake of the Wiesen Festivals.

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Apart from these changes, the festivals were extended. Everything started with one single Jazz Festival, today there are seven different kinds of Festivals. The highlight is still the Jazz festival, but reggae, alternative and hip-hop festivals have been added in the last years. In order to fulfil the increasing demand in music festivals, Wiesen Gmbh has opened two new festival places in Austria since 2002.

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Chapter 3

Organization of a Festival

3.1. The Organization and leadership

style

An organization exists to serve its purpose. The main reason for any festival organization is to offer quality service, which makes the event successful. This leads to satisfying the needs of all festival customers. The organization has to focus on the achievement of the required steps of action through its personnel.

Flexibility is an important influential factor due to organizational system. It needs to cope with the changing circumstances, which appear during an event. In determining the organizational structure, several facts have to be taken into consideration. One of them is defining the

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aims and objectives, analysing the internal and external environment and specifying the tasks, which have to be undertaken. The other is grouping and linking them together, establishing an understanding of respective roles for all those involved and identifying possible communication lines between various groups.

The size of the structure heavily depends on the size of the event but it does not mean that there is a great difference between various structures. Being bigger is not necessarily better. The organisational structure has to cover planning, developing, working out relationships and ways to achieve objectives. The chains of command, span of control and areas of delegated responsibility are shown in this system. The importance is that everyone involved knows, of whom he or she is in charge of and who to sub co-ordinate. They also have to know what their duties are and where their place in the system is. Nevertheless, each structure has to be made individually depending on the nature of the event in order to meet all specific wants and needs.

For instance the Wiesen Festival organisation is divided into several departments such as marketing, booking, catering,

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promotion, etc. All of them have their own style of working and they do it more or less independently. The process is controlled and guided through policies and objectives which are set by the heads of the Wiesen Concerts and Veranstanltungs GmbH and Mr. Bogner.

It is a bottom up management, which means that not just the heads of the organisation make decisions but also every department head is included in his team.

3.2. Vision and Mission Statement

A vision statement need not be the same as the mission statement. In general the vision statement describes the longterm desires of an operation. In basic they are brief and motivational.

For instance, the Wiesen Festivals should be the biggest and most famous festival and concert providers in Austria. Whereby the mission statement is referred to the near future. It is implementing the way of getting close to the vision. The mission statement defines an event’s purpose; it identifies

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major benefits and customer groups. It is an overall philosophy of the organisation. Once established, the basis is set for implementing goals, objectives and strategies. Furthermore, it helps the staff (paid/ voluntary) understanding the event and what it is trying to achieve. For instance, the Wiesen Festivals provide a high quality in music and service to meet the needs of the target customers.

3.3. Aims and Objectives

Any event has to have specific aims and objectives to create an all over understanding of the reason why this event is made.

A clear and specified aim is important for the search of finance and staff. Through the developing of aims a special direction is outlined in which the event will go. Therefore the event manager already has limitations in finding sources of money and staff which are matching the stated aim. Besides that, if the aim is clearly stated and a certain outcome is expected,

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investors have a reason to invest and people have a reason to work for.

If you don’t know where you are going you will probably end up somewhere else (Dr. Laurence J Peter and Raymond Hill) The aim is only reached by developing a way to get there. This way has to be broken down into objectives, which should be agreed upon and understood by everyone who involved. Communicating these objectives to all people is one of the most important tasks. Therefore they have to be simple, appropriate, clear unambiguous and achievable.

3.4. Managing of the Festival

The next step, which follows almost automatically, is establishing the individual organisational structure. The developed objectives help to scope the work. Individual tasks can be given to groups of people who are capable of achieving the best outcome. Through this kind of structure a unity of purpose and an atmosphere of co-operation is created. Consequently an

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overlapping of responsibilities, confusion and conflicts are avoided.

These teams have to be properly delegated to come to a result. Delegation does not mean just giving out commands. It should lead to commitment and motivation. The group leader has to give directions on how things have to be done, but he can never achieve anything without the group behind him. Therefore it is very important to give positive and negative feedback to the staff. It is essential to make the group aware of their purpose and to encourage them.

Furthermore it is easier to add additional functions, as the needs of the event might require them. Each unit has its own assigned resource such as e.g. money, time, staff, equipment and supplies. This again is used as a basis for cost and risk management. In the end, costs of each “project” are summed up to give the total cost of the work to create the event. With these steps a schedule of work is created which helps later on when all tasks are reunited into one. Nevertheless an overall plan has to be carried out to make the event successful. Considering the fact that planning it

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produces everything that happens, is the most important thing to do. Therefore it has to be carefully done because it decreases mistakes and increases the working process. Each Wiesen Festival department has its own objectives to achieve. For instance, the Wiesen Concerts and Veranstaltungs GmbH want to increase its foreign customers by up to 5%. This would be an objective for the marketing department.

3.5. Human Resources Strategy

The process of human resources strategy has to cover a wide area. It includes the establishment of strategies and objectives, as well as the establishment of guiding strategies and objectives. The human resources manager is responsible for determining staff needs and producing job descriptions and specification.

Another significant factor is staffing itself. Decisions have to be made based on the number of paid and voluntary staff needed. Furthermore the right mix of skills, qualifications and experience are required to be successful. Personnel reflects the

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quality of the event, thus employees should be carefully chosen and trained in handling customers. Last but not least, the planning process needs to include the point in time these staff/ volunteers will be required. The co-ordinating of the human resources starts with identifying all tasks, which are linked to the event creation, delivery and shutdown. Site-related tasks, such as, setting up fences, stage building, toilets, placing signs…etc., help to structure the work, which has to be done. Secondly, it has to be determined how many people are needed to complete the range of tasks and which ones are more important to fulfil. Furthermore, the level of supervision plays an important role, because without supervision people will be lost.

Along with the job analysis comes the job description. It is a statement on why a job has come into existence, what the duties are and under what conditions the job has to be done. Generally, it includes information on the paid or voluntary positions, the functional area and the working hours. The wage, salary or hourly rate must be stated, as well as bonuses.

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