So, rumour has it that....

[smiley33]

Mr Eavis has sold out to the 'corporates' and is in either his last or last but one year of a 4 year handover period and is now bitterly regretting it...

anyone else hear this?

[zeppelin]

nope, and don't believe it.

[Gary]

I'm fairly sure Emily would have something to say about that, given that it's her inheritance etc.

[Sabcully]

What bad news that would be, but would not surprise me. Really hated it when Orange came on to get everybody tagged on bloody Facebook. Corporate bull shit and everybody was so bloody up for it.

:angry:

[shortleg]

That sounds bollox

[hedgepeg]

I'm sure his cows would be pretty pissed off. Besides didn't he already hand over a lot of stuff to that mean fiddler person?

[DTichborne]

Is this possibly a misinterpretation of old news where Mean Fiddler increased its stake from 10% to 40% across four festivals, by agreement?

It should be noted that the involvement of Melvyn Benn had some positives, not least the fact that these days getting a license is not a struggle...

[smiley33]

I hope it is all bollox - was dead disappointed when I heard it - apparently Emily has a job for life if she wants it.

[hatethisandillloveyou]

Just out of interest where did this "rumour" come from

[BlackHole2006]

Just out of interest where did this "rumour" come from

[smiley33]

Windinglake Farm, next door neighbour...

Seemed pretty adamant...

[Gary]

What bad news that would be, but would not surprise me. Really hated it when Orange came on to get everybody tagged on bloody Facebook. Corporate bull shit and everybody was so bloody up for it.

:angry:

[fatyeti24]

May I enquire as to your reasoning for this? Obviously Orange got a lot of free advertising but ultimately they provided a really useful facility for charging phones, offered the free GlastoNav for those that way inclined and gave away a load of free tickets. They probably paid a lot to be involved too. I think in the scheme of things having a big mobile phone company doing that stuff is quite insignificant.

If it had been Shell or BP or the like I could imagine your issues but I really fail to see what the big problem is.

[Gary]

i turned my back on that big photo thing during the WC match on wednesday. i understand why the festival has sponsorship, and i also accept that with that comes a bit of on site advertising, but i do not agree that i have to be complicit in their adverts. that, to me, is not insignificant.

[fatyeti24]

I've checked it out and you can actually remove yourself with relative ease from the photo anyway. Obviously just turning round saves effort later...

Still. I think for the most part it's just a bit of fun. It's not as if we're being forced to wear Orange t-shirts.

[shiveringsky]

The Orange thing did leave a bit of a bad taste in my mouth but I just stayed on the ground and didn't get involved. Quite simple really.

I trust the Eavii and while I hope this isn't true, I don't think they would do anything which wasn't in the best interest of the festival.

[Poleski]

No chance.

[Gary]

I didn't put my tent up during the day at all in order to avoid it being in the huge aerial photo in Q which lots of people want and buy the Q Review for. I don't want my tent appearing and being used in their marketing!

[strudders]

Hospitality is getting bigger each year....

however they are paying to keep the ticket price down...

Its your choice, you can make the festival as commercial as you like or very roots driven. Nobody is asking you to buy into the corporate side, its there to be avoided.. I cant imagine the bimble inn being allowed at Reading or V.

The only commercial crap I saw all weekend was the orange charge and chill, Tuborg Larger (other were on sale)and the hospitality camping area next to ours at Disabled..

Drink at the cider bus, bimble inn, stonebridge etc.. Eat t the green fields/Greenpeace.Take spare batteries for your phone.. job done.

[Sabcully]

May I enquire as to your reasoning for this? Obviously Orange got a lot of free advertising but ultimately they provided a really useful facility for charging phones, offered the free GlastoNav for those that way inclined and gave away a load of free tickets. They probably paid a lot to be involved too. I think in the scheme of things having a big mobile phone company doing that stuff is quite insignificant.

If it had been Shell or BP or the like I could imagine your issues but I really fail to see what the big problem is.

[eFestivals]

Mr Eavis has sold out to the 'corporates' and is in either his last or last but one year of a 4 year handover period and is now bitterly regretting it...

anyone else hear this?

I've heard nothing but....

What has he "sold out"? The farm as well? I'd be hugely surprised if he sold the farm, and without the farm there's not really anything to sell. The festival brand wouldn't survive if the festival had to move from Worthy Farm.

What was Mean Fiddler and is now Festival Republic (FR) have owned a stake in the festival operating company* (but not it's parent controlling company I believe) for most of the last decade, starting at 10% and rising to 40%.

*there's two companies - Glastonbury Festivals Ltd which is the parent company, and the operating company that holds (a limited time?) licence to operate the festival called Glastonbury Festival (year) Ltd, with the "year" part being renamed each year to be the year of that festival.

The original agreement with Mean Fiddler was for 4 years (upto and including the 2005 fest). A further agreement was made for the festivals beyond that with (what is now) FR, and while I have little idea of the terms of that 2nd agreement I believe it's again an agreement that expires* after a set number of festivals.

(* while the agreement expires, I'm unsure what happens with the stake that FR owns for that time - presumably that expires too).

Ever since Michael made the original agreement with Mean Fiddler there's been rumours flying around that he's desperately unhappy with it, but if things were as bad as has been suggested then it's unlikely the agreement would have been renewed.

I've spoken with Michael explicitly about the agreements on occasions over the years, and he's made unprompted references to an aspect of it now and then on occasion too, and while there might be occasional frictions over different ideas over how things should be done, there's been no suggestion by him of the general unhappiness that's suggested by your post or by the rumours that go around. I've had nothing from him aside from it being the practical way for the festival to get past its difficulties and keep operating, and a happy enough acceptance of that.

What is happening in the background is Emily taking a greater and greater role, taking more of the load off Michael each year. There obviously has to be a plan for things beyond Michael's lifetime, but as far as I'm aware (tho this is now a few years old) the plan has been for the parent company to either be turned into charitable trust or owned by a charitable trust, or for the same but an Eavis family trust fund of some kind - I'm not clear which is these it might be. None of what I've heard has suggested a sell-out to anyone.

[Sabcully]

Hospitality is getting bigger each year....

however they are paying to keep the ticket price down...

Its your choice, you can make the festival as commercial as you like or very roots driven. Nobody is asking you to buy into the corporate side, its there to be avoided.. I cant imagine the bimble inn being allowed at Reading or V.

The only commercial crap I saw all weekend was the orange charge and chill, Tuborg Larger (other were on sale)and the hospitality camping area next to ours at Disabled..

Drink at the cider bus, bimble inn, stonebridge etc.. Eat t the green fields/Greenpeace.Take spare batteries for your phone.. job done.

[Mahdnyw]

While I wouldn't call it corporate, this years Glasto did have a lot more overt sponsorship than previous years.

And the "business hippies" certainly seemed to be cashing in a lot more than normal this year also.

Some of the more (previously) subdued cafes & venues in the green fields seemed to be more flashy than normal and consequently felt a bit forced perhaps.

[5co77ie]

While I wouldn't call it corporate, this years Glasto did have a lot more overt sponsorship than previous years.

And the "business hippies" certainly seemed to be cashing in a lot more than normal this year also.

Some of the more (previously) subdued cafes & venues in the green fields seemed to be more flashy than normal and consequently felt a bit forced perhaps.

[buckshee]

it has got more and more corporate without a doubt and the whole hospitality thing is starting to get a bit like the V festival .

Let's forget about all the Michael does it for the love of it crap as he's a businessman at the end of the day and two years ago he earned around £1.4M from the festival but that's not to say he doesn't care about how it's run.

I had to walk from the new west 52 car park this year which is around a two hour round trip to where we were camped just the other side of the west family camping field , this was because the closer parking has been given over to hospitality and frankly that is not only not within the spirit of the festival and quite frankly not acceptable