Everfest and the Event Safety Alliance Announce Partnership to Support the Safe Relaunch of Live Entertainment and Venues
AUSTIN, TX and CUYAHOGA FLS, OH – June 22, 2020 – Everfest, a division of Qcue, and The Event Safety Alliance (ESA) have announced a partnership focused on providing guidance to organizations and municipalities looking to relaunch events safely as part of the recovery from the current COVID-19 pandemic.
“With concerns around travel, small, hyper-local festivals are likely to be the first events to come back. These festivals, and the vendors that work them, are Everfest’s partners. We believe that it is our responsibility to these festivals, our larger partners, and the entire live entertainment ecosystem to make sure that when these festivals happen, they are safe for everyone involved and provide replicable template for larger events, festivals, and mass gatherings,” said Barry Kahn, CEO of Qcue.
Everfest maintains an event-discovery site and festival guide with over 20,000 festivals listed worldwide. It also supports thousands of vendors that service the festival space through its B2B product, Everfest Pro. According to Kahn, in the midst of the current pandemic, a key component to that support is ensuring the availability of safe guidelines to all members of the festival community and the municipalities that host these important local events.
The ESA’s Reopening Guide, recently translated additionally into French and Chinese, addresses health and sanitary issues that event and venue professionals need to consider in order to protect both patrons and workers. The first edition is tailored to be especially useful for event professionals reopening the smallest events with the fewest resources available to mitigate their risks, since in every municipal reopening plan these will be allowed to reopen first.
“The live entertainment industry has been disproportionally impacted by this pandemic,” Derek Palmer from Everfest noted. “We were among the first to close and will be among the last to come back fully. It is critical that this recovery is done as safely as possible not only for fans, but for the huge number of employees and contributors to the live entertainment ecosystem. The first part of this important partnership will be highlighting access to the ESA guidelines and providing support to our festivals, vendors, and the municipalities as they look to reopen safely. We look forward to supporting the future initiatives of the ESA.
“The ESA’s focus is on health and safety practices for the event industry at large, providing reasonable guidance derived from subject matter experts. Formed in response to the Indiana State Fair tragedy in 2011, the ESA continues to expand its advocacy with each new challenge faced by our industry. COVID-19 is the latest and possibly most challenging of our history, said ESA Chairman Jim Digby “In response we have released the COVID supplement “Reopening Guide” to help steer safe practices for those who are coming back online. In these times we have yet again been required to expand our resources to cover the unanticipated disease and infection mitigation in addition to the currently known risks associated with putting on events. We’re pleased to have been able to respond immediately by crafting ESA’s Reopening Guidance and have recently completed translations into French and Chinese to aid our fellow professionals on a global scale.”
“We highly value the Everfest relationship with a firm belief that small festivals will be leading the way back to a sustainable future and will become the litmus test for the industry at large. We look forward to working with Everfest to be in a position to help ensure that these first events are successful, both in their own safety, and in the manner in whcih they pave the way for the reopening of larger events.”
About Everfest
Everfest, has become the industry’s leading festival authority, serving fans, vendors, artists, and festivals. Recognized as one of the 10 Most Innovative Companies in the Live Entertainment, Everfest brings every part of the festival ecosystem together. Facilitating interaction between organizers, vendors, artists and fans across festival genres the world over, Everfest truly is the marketplace for festivals. Everfest was acquired by Qcue in 2019. For more information, visit www.everfest.com.
About the Event Safety Alliance
The Event Safety Alliance (ESA) is a non-profit membership driven organization dedicated to promoting “life safety first” throughout all phases of event production and execution. ESA’s mission is to help event professionals and our guests be empowered, safe, and aware of the reasonably foreseeable risks around them. For more information, visit www.eventsafetyalliance.org.
Find ESA’s reopening guidance here.