2023-07-12 21:23:22
Jérôme Tréhorel, the director of the Breton festival of Vieilles Charrues, recalled the need to offer affordable tickets for the public. And this, despite a general increase in costs.
On the eve of the opening of the 31st associative music festival of the Vieilles Charrues, organized in Carhaix-Plouguer, in Finistère, BFM Business received the director of the event Jérôme Tréhorel. And, this year, the budget of the festival exploded since it reached 23 million euros.
An increase which is explained by the addition of a special day for the concert of the Red Hot Chili Peppers but also by the inflation that the music industry suffers like other sectors.
More expensive stamps
Among the organizational costs that add to the budget, there are also artists’ fees.
“Fifteen years ago, the program for Les Vieilles Charrues had a budget of around 1.7 million euros. Today we are at more than 5 million euros for the same number of artists”, emphasizes Jérôme Tréhorel.
The festival must therefore sell more tickets to be profitable. “While it had reached 90 to 95% since the post-covid recovery, in the second year of significant inflation in a row, the rate of tickets to be sold to be in balance rather reached 105 to 110%”, estimates the president.
An accessible event
“This means that the model no longer works and that we have to reinvent ourselves to maintain both attractive ticket prices for the public and programming that makes people dream,” he continues.
The organizers of the festival make it a point of honor that it remains above all an accessible event. “Culture and concerts must not become luxury products”, he says. The festival has thus chosen to maintain the traditional price of the entry ticket at 44 euros.
“What we observe and which I find dangerous is to see concerts for large gauges at 200, 300 or 400 euros”, he denounces, referring to “indecent prices”.
“Participating in an associative festival like the Vieilles charrues is a militant act,” he concludes.
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