Market Research and Feasibility Studies for New Festivals

Before you dive headfirst into organizing your new festival, you need to answer a critical question: Is your festival idea truly viable? Many enthusiastic event founders have learned the hard way that passion alone isn’t enough – a festival must fill a real market need and be realistically achievable given the resources and support available. This is where thorough market research and a feasibility study come in. It’s time to put on your researcher hat and objectively evaluate your festival concept from all angles: the competition, the demand, potential attendance, strengths and weaknesses, and support from the community and stakeholders. Doing this homework upfront can save you from costly mistakes and set your festival up for success.

Survey the Competitive Landscape

Start by looking outward: what other festivals or events are already out there in your region or within your festival’s niche? Understanding the competitive landscape helps you see where your idea fits and how to differentiate it. Make a list of festivals that could be considered competition – those in the same genre (music, food, film, etc.), or those in the same geographic area and timeframe.

• Direct Competitors: These are festivals very similar in theme/genre and target audience. For example, if you want to start a boutique electronic music festival in your state, identify other electronic music festivals in the region. How big are they, what artists do they book, and what ticket prices do they charge? If the market is saturated with similar events, you’ll need an angle to set yours apart or a compelling reason why the area can support another festival.
• Indirect Competitors: These might not be the same kind of festival, but they compete for the same audience’s time and money. A large county fair or a popular concert series on the same weekend might pull people away from your event. List any major events around the dates you plan to hold your festival and consider avoiding date conflicts with well-established crowd-pullers, especially in your first year.
• Learn from Others: As you research competitors, note both their successes and shortcomings. Read reviews or news articles about them. What do attendees rave about, and what do they complain about? Perhaps a rival music festival has great bands but terrible parking and lines – that’s an opportunity for you to shine in logistics. Or a food festival might be beloved but perhaps it ignores a certain cuisine that you could feature. By benchmarking other events, you’ll gather ideas on best practices and also find gaps your festival can fill.

Understanding the landscape will also feed into how you pitch your festival. If questioned by investors, partners, or the media on why your festival deserves attention, you can confidently explain how it’s unique compared to others and why your region or community needs it.

Assess Demand and Attendance Potential

Next, evaluate the demand for your festival concept. It’s time for some honest appraisal: do people actually want this festival to happen? And roughly how many might attend? Estimating demand helps shape everything from venue size to budget and is a core part of a feasibility study.

Here are a few strategies:

• Audience Surveys and Interest Polls: As part of your initial research, directly ask potential attendees if they would be interested in your event. This could be an online survey shared in relevant community groups or email lists: e.g., “Would you attend a two-day vegan food festival in our city? How much would you pay for a ticket? What would you want to see there?” Collecting even a few hundred responses can provide valuable insight. High enthusiasm in responses can validate your idea; lukewarm feedback might mean you need to adjust the concept or target audience.
• Attendance of Similar Events: Look for data or estimates of attendance at comparable festivals. If a neighboring town has a film festival that draws 5,000 people annually and you’re planning one with a similar concept in your town, that number is a clue (adjust for population differences and event quality). If you’re doing something new with no exact parallels, find analogous events. For instance, maybe no one has a comic-book convention in your area, but a local sci-fi movie marathon night draws a certain crowd – that hints at an existing interest you can grow.
• Social Media and Online Buzz: Gauge the online chatter around your festival idea. If you’ve announced the concept on social media, what’s the response? Are people sharing it, tagging friends, saying “I can’t wait” or is it crickets? Tools like Google Trends can also indicate if interest in your festival’s theme (say, “craft beer festivals” or “K-Pop events near me”) is on the rise. If you have artists or elements in mind, see if those names spark excitement in your target community online.
• Geographic and Seasonal Factors: Consider your location and timing in terms of demand. Are you hosting in a tourist-friendly city or a small town? Big urban centers can draw larger crowds but also have more competition. Smaller locales might have tight-knit communities but a limited audience size. Also, is your festival date in peak season or off-season? A beach event in summer might naturally attract more people (and tourists) than one in winter, unless it’s a holiday theme. Seasonal demand matters.

After gathering this data, make a realistic projection for attendance. Perhaps you estimate 2,000 people for a first-year niche festival based on interest and comparables. That figure will be key for budgeting and logistics planning. It’s better to be conservative at first – it’s easier to scale up if unexpectedly huge crowds show interest than to deal with expenses for 10,000 people when only 1,000 actually come.

Conduct a SWOT Analysis

Performing a SWOT analysis is a classic business tool that is extremely useful for festival feasibility. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Sit down with your team (or just a notebook if you’re solo at this stage) and systematically list the internal and external factors that could affect your festival:

• Strengths: These are internal advantages of your festival concept or team. For example, perhaps you have a great lineup of local bands eager to play (musical talent is a strength), or someone on your team has 10 years of event logistics experience. Maybe the festival theme is very timely or you’ve secured a perfect venue at low cost. List anything that gives you a leg up.
• Weaknesses: Internal challenges or gaps. Be honest here – do you lack experience in a critical area (say, marketing)? Is funding very limited? Maybe your concept is fantastic but very niche, which could limit broad appeal. Recognizing weaknesses helps you plan to address them (like bringing on a consultant, or adjusting goals to be realistic).
• Opportunities: External factors you can capitalize on. Look at trends – is there a growing cultural interest that your festival taps into? Perhaps the local government is promoting tourism and might support new events, or a big anniversary (like a city’s 100th year) is coming up, aligning with your timing. An opportunity could also be a sponsorship prospect; e.g., a new brewery opened in town that might love to sponsor a beer festival.
• Threats: External risks and obstacles. These can include competition (we identified those earlier), economic factors (e.g., is there a recession that might hurt ticket sales?), weather concerns (planning an outdoor event during a historically rainy month is a threat), or even political/community opposition (maybe there’s a group that doesn’t want loud music in the area). Also consider health and safety factors like pandemics – as we saw in 2020, such threats can drastically impact events.

Mapping out SWOT in writing gives you a panoramic view of your festival’s feasibility. It lets you plan strategies: leverage your strengths, shore up or mitigate weaknesses, seize opportunities, and have contingency plans for threats. For instance, if one threat is a well-established competitor festival, you might plan your date carefully or join forces with them rather than compete. If a weakness is lack of funding, an opportunity might be to partner with a nonprofit or sponsor to get financial support.

Gauge Community and Stakeholder Support

No festival can succeed in isolation – you’ll need buy-in from various stakeholders and the broader community. Part of your feasibility study is to gauge the support and enthusiasm of those whose backing will be crucial.

• Local Community & Authorities: If your festival is to take place in a town or neighborhood, early on feel out the community sentiment. Are local residents likely to support it, volunteer, attend, or are they worried about noise and crowds? Sometimes meeting with a city council member or local events committee to float your idea can give insight. Community support can also mean the difference when it comes to permits and ease of operation. A city that sees value (cultural or economic) in your festival will be more accommodating.
• Sponsors and Partners: Reach out to potential sponsors or partner organizations to test the waters. For example, if it’s a food festival, do local restaurants or breweries seem interested in participating? If it’s a tech or film festival, maybe local businesses or universities might want to be involved. A few letters of intent or even informal “that sounds great, we’d probably sponsor” conversations can validate your festival’s appeal to stakeholders. If you encounter a lot of hesitation or “no, we wouldn’t invest in that” feedback, you may need to refine the concept to be more attractive.
• Vendors and Talent: Similarly, check in with the people you’d be hiring or inviting – the food trucks, bands, artists, or filmmakers. Do they find the festival concept appealing? If performers are excited and interested even before you fully launch, that’s a positive sign of feasibility. If many seem skeptical or the best ones are all booked out by other events (meaning scheduling will be hard), take note. It could mean adjusting timing or approach.
• Financial Viability: Although detailed budgeting might come later, feasibility includes a high-level check of whether the economics can work. Start asking: How much roughly will this festival cost to execute (infrastructure, talent, marketing)? And based on your attendance projections and possible ticket price, can you generate enough revenue or sponsorship to cover that? If you do a back-of-the-envelope calculation and find you’d need 20,000 attendees paying $100 each just to break even (when your research suggests only 5,000 might come), that’s a red flag to scale down or re-think the model. Sometimes feasibility means recognizing you should start smaller and build up over years.

Test the Concept if Possible

If feasible, do a small test run or pilot for your festival idea before committing fully. This might mean hosting a one-day mini-event or even a launch party that samples what you want to do. For example, if you dream of a week-long film festival, maybe start with a 2-day “preview” festival or a monthly film night leading up to it. Gauge the turnout and feedback. If your pop-up food fair draws a big crowd on a Sunday afternoon, it’s a good indicator of demand for a larger festival. Pilots can also attract media and stakeholder attention in a lower-risk way, building momentum and proving the concept.

In conclusion, doing thorough market research and a feasibility study is like constructing the scaffolding for your festival. It may not be the most glamorous part of planning – it involves spreadsheets, surveys, and sober second thought – but it is immensely important. By understanding the competitive landscape, confirming there’s an audience who wants to attend, analyzing your festival’s strengths and challenges, and ensuring key players support the idea, you set yourself up for a festival that can actually succeed. This process might even save you from pursuing a direction that isn’t viable, allowing you to tweak the concept into something that will work. Think of it this way: it’s much better to uncover issues on paper now than on the day of the event. With solid research and planning, you’ll move forward with confidence that your festival has a firm footing in reality as well as in your dreams.