What did YOU think of the 2014 Bradley Stoke Community Festival, staged over three days last weekend?
The town council spends around £24,000 staging the popular event, with most of this going to an events management company, which undertakes the bulk of the organisation on the council’s behalf.
Events over the weekend include the pre-school ‘picnic in the park’ on the Friday, the community fair and football tournament on the Saturday and the 10k run, bed race and cricket match on the Sunday.
This year, an additional £2,400 of taxpayers’ money, from South Gloucestershire Council’s Positive Activities Subsidy grants scheme, was used to pay for a two-day skate event over the festival weekend, organised by local youngsters.
Bradley Stoke town councillors will this week discuss how they feel the event went and make recommendations for next year’s event.
What would you tell them, if you had the chance? Here a few questions to get the ball rolling:
- Does the event represent value for money?
- Were you given enough information about what was going on (and where) over the festival weekend?
- Do you have any comments about specific events and how they might be improved?
- For events and attractions where a charge was made, was this reasonable?
- Is there too much going on over one weekend, i.e. should the festival be longer? (Patchway’s festival runs over two weeks)
- Do you have suggestions for additional events that could be included in the festival programme in future years?
If you have anything to say about the festival, please leave a comment on this story.
Yes, a two week festival sounds a good idea. Families have other commitments on a weekend, so any who’s kids have taken part in the football tournament on Saturday and then supported a parent in the 10k run on Sunday morning are unlikely to have time to attend the other events on Sunday. But if these events were on the following weekend, they might.
Really enjoyed the festival…especially the birds of prey flying around. The bulk of £24,000 going to an events management company seems excessive, especially just for one weekend and considering that many stalls are raising money for charity. I think that needs to be looked at….couldn’t a group of volunteers lighten the load/lessen the cost?
If the festival were to be spread over 2 weeks, what would the cost implications be, if a weekend is £24k? That would need to be looked at.
I like the fact that it is over one weekend …it would become less special otherwise, and a major draw is that people come together…there would not be as many locals around if spread over 2 weeks. The atmosphere (and whole point ) of the festival would be lost in my opinion.
One small criticism….I felt sorry for the band on stage as sometimes they were trying to play when music was blaring out of speakers for dancing etc. It sounded awful…maybe try to timetable the music to avoid this?
Just to be clear, the £24,000 includes the costs of hiring bands and other performers (such as the birds of prey), toilet hire, PA hire, and much more. These are all arranged by the event management company.
All income from the event, e.g rents from commercial stallholders goes into the Mayor’s charity fund.
How much fees get the Event Management Company? Surely they keep part of the £24000? All those company in this country are greedy and total rip off. Event/Entertainment Manager was my job for 15 years in Spain (Tenerife) and I always avoid all those companies, and booked directly. I would like to know how much were paid the bands? £24000..give me a break!
To be honest I forgot it was on until I drove down Braydon Avenue and wondered why there were so many badly parked cars.
Minimal promotion and advertising and it was all just a bit naff.
The festival is a great way of getting the community together and the kids loved it.
Would it not be a good idea to set up a local event planning group to help organise the event, getting local schools involved with competitions and stalls and sponsors? That way more kids are involved, the locals are much more involved which will help with the marketing, schools get a chance to showcase their talents, local groups etc.
The festival needs to be for the local community by the local community. If this was an option, I would love to get involved.
Correction: The £24,000 figure quoted in the article was the spend on the 2013 festival. The budget for this year’s festival was lower, at £21,000.
Figures revealed at tonight’s meeting of the BSTC Leisure, Youth & Amenities Committee show that a ‘management fee’ of £9,120 was paid to the events management company employed by the council.
The town clerk stated that a detailed breakdown of expenditure will be placed on the town council website. When it appears, a link will be included here.