New Reports On Big Day Out's Financial Dilemma Surface

Big Day Out was 165,000 attendees short of turning a profit in 2014, a report from Fairfax has claimed today, as further details of the festival's financial struggle continue to surface.

In today's article it is suggested that the festival needed 300,000 people in total to attend its six events last month in order to make money, but “accurate crowd figures” obtained by Fairfax showed that only 135,000 people made it along to the event. The report claims that the Adelaide and Perth events – the most poorly attended of the six – drew a mere 12,000 each.

On Friday afternoon AJ Maddah admitted to triple j's Hack program that he was expecting an “ugly” financial wash up when losses were tallied, Fairfax today report that the figure will be over $10 million.

Fairfax have also claimed that it was for financial reasons that Britpop legends Blur pulled out of the festival just eight weeks before its commencement. Citing “music industry sources”, Fairfax have said that Big Day Out would not fulfil their initial offer to have Blur close the festival on their own stage due to the significant production costs, a claim Maddah refuted in the triple j interview on Friday.

Today he has also stated that Fairfax's claim that Blur were booked for $4 million was also incorrect, saying the band were actually given more.

@balrog16 No. They were paid more than that.

— AJ (@iamnotshouting) February 9, 2014

Further controversy abounds with news that a number of attendees were reporting the festival to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and Scamwatch, claiming to be ripped off by the premium Like A Boss tickets.

Complainants claim the $100 extra did not secure them better vantage points, shorter bar queues or better food options and that many left these areas in favour of general admission areas.

A Big Day Out spokeswoman told Fairfax that no issues about the Like A Boss tickets had been raised by the ACCC or Scamwatch at this time.