More Venues Share Challenges After Zoo Closure
“Only the strong will survive and the music scene in Brisbane will suffer as a consequence.”
The Zoo (Supplied)
QMusic, Queensland’s music industry development association, has shared a statement following yesterday’s devastating announcement about the closure of The Zoo and its sibling venue, Stranded. The statement reveals that more Brisbane venues are feeling the exact challenges faced by those two venues.
Disclosing that the struggles The Zoo faced “aren’t isolated”, QMusic added that members of the association have had “many conversations” with venue promoters, with Instagram tiles with comments from owners of The Zoo, Mo’s Desert Club House, Black Bear Lodge, Elixir Music House, Fortitude Music Hall, The Triffid, and Sol Bar.
The Zoo’s Nathan Farrell revealed that March, often a super busy month, has been packed with cancellations and postponements—up to 15 in just one month. “We had 20 confirmed shows in November last year, in the end it will only be eight shows in the whole month of March,” Farrell stated.
John Collins from the Fortitude Music Hall and The Triffid in Fortitude Valley noted that the smaller music venues “absorb many of the costs of running shows”, including security and production, so it’s affordable for the artist to hire the venue. Writing that The Triffid “has had to contend with increased costs around 30% and lower attendances sometimes up to 60% lower than expected,” it’s clear that running a music venue isn’t simple or cheap.
Mo’s Desert Clubhouse’s Christian Tryhorn added, “There has never been a tougher time to successfully run an independent venue in history” with increased operational costs and fewer ticket buyers.
For Mo’s, pre-sale ticket trends are down by 75% with a 20% no-show rate, with 50% of punters turning up for the show, while the venue is dealing with a 150-200% operational costs increase in the last year.
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Alex Johns, of Sunshine Coast’s Sol Bar, plainly stated, “Costs are spiralling and sales are heading in the opposite direction direction.”
At Sol Bar, gross weekly revenue has declined by 20% yearly, with the “super bad weeks” at 40%. “Our Public Liability premium jumped from 35k in 2019 to 211k this renewal plus excess is $100k per claim. It’s not sustainable.”
Braydon Ritson (of the Black Bear Lodge) also mentioned the increase in insurance costs, noting a jump of “$80,554 in 2022 to $142,751 in 2024”—over 77% in two years.
Power costs have also increased between 40% and 50%, production costs “at least” 20%, while revenue is in “steady and worrying decline”. Ritson added, “Only the strong will survive and the music scene in Brisbane will suffer as a consequence.”
Elixir Music House’s Sky Rixon wrote that “Entertainment is again the first to leave people’s spend list” in tough times, noting a “decline of about 30%—40% attendance over the last year and a half.” The increased costs in supply and decline in revenue are “breaking” the venue.
Rixon continued, “We live in a 24-hour economy, it would be great if government supported those who work in the other side of the ‘normal’ 9-5ers. We contribute deeply to the economic sustainability and the general well-being and thrive of a community.”
Taking to Instagram, QMusic wrote in the caption outlining the venues’ hardships: “The QMusic team, like so many Brisbanites and beyond, are feeling the impending loss of The Zoo hard today. Along with each of our personal memories, it has also been a venue within BIGSOUND for many, many years and we can’t imagine the event without it.”
The statement continued, “We are in ongoing discussions with both the State and Federal Government regarding the matter and we're committed to assisting with positive change in this area.”
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