The Coachella Valley lost $2.5 Billion dollars over half a season and a lot of people are worried about how businesses will stay open if the festival is delayed a third time. Coachella is one of the biggest music festivals in the world, attracting around 100,000 people each weekend.
The pandemic force Coachella April dates to be postponed until now, October. But Rolling Stone Magazine says Coachella is being postponed again, and not until next April, but next October.
“We haven’t received confirmation from Golden Voice or AEG that the festival has been postponed, but when we planned our budget for the 2020 and 2021 cycle, we forecasted that we would be short the $5 million dollars that we usually see in April from the festival revenues,” said Lube Ramos Amith, Councilmember, City of Indio.
That $5 Million is a drop in the deserts bucket, it doesn’t take into account the money that spills over into other desert cities, at restaurants, hotels, and grocery stores. Still, in planning ahead, the city of Indio says it has reserves to cover a drop in revenue.
“We don’t foresee any layoffs or any shortages in services in the city of Indio because we have enough reserves to cover that, but the impact to the community, to the region, to the businesses, is a much bigger picture,” added Ramos
“This is just going to be another layer of devastation, not just for small businesses, but large businesses as well right, so all of our hotels throughout the region,” said Katie Stice, CEO of Rancho Mirage Chamber of Commerce.
The Coachella Valley Chamber of Commerce stressed back in August that the loss would be devastating, and now the region is looking at more losses.
“You’re talking with a b, not an m, billions, billions of dollars that we’re losing in overall economic activity not just to the local Coachella valley but to the region,” said Joshua Bonner, President, and CEO of The Greater Coachella Valley Chamber of Commerce.
The city of Indio says if they do receive confirmation of another postponement they will re-group, and looking further into the future the hope to bring back festival season stronger than ever.
“When we originally approved the master plan for the festivals they were allowed to have up to five festivals a year. if they want to catch up the city of Indio welcomes them and invites them to have five festivals a year,” explained Ramos.
We did reach out to Golden Voice and AEG for an official statement, but they have yet to respond.
