With sunny weather, beautiful views, and lots of open space, California is one of the country’s most popular settings for music festivals. Thousands of people travel to the Golden State every summer to attend dozens of festivals — including Coachella, the most-attended annual music festival in North America. However, it’s getting more expensive to run a music festival in California as the cost of living keeps going up. Prices for transportation, accommodations, labor, and refreshments have skyrocketed above the typical year-to-year increases. For example, organizers for the California Roots Festival spent $16,000 to rent portable toilets this year; the same rental cost $10,000 in 2023.
Meanwhile, many festival goers are becoming reluctant to buy tickets, especially in advance. Instead of purchasing early-bird tickets at discounted prices as attendees have done in years past, more people are either choosing to spend less or wait until the last minute to commit. This presents a new problem for organizers, who rely on early sales to raise enough cash to hire vendors and rent supplies. As a result, some music festivals have been forced to cancel with little notice as they run out of money. Last-minute cancellations damage customer confidence, leading to more reluctance to buy tickets in advance and starting the cycle over again.
The problem isn’t limited to California or to music festivals. Experts say sluggish ticket sales are a national trend affecting the entire live event industry, and generational differences may be a major factor. Members of Generation Z, who were born between the years 1997 and 2012, tend to have different social habits than previous generations. Many report that they frequently experience loneliness. A recent survey of young people asked why they weren’t going to music festivals very often, and one of the most popular responses was, “I didn’t think I had a friend I could go with.” Some industry insiders fear that the long-term effects of the pandemic could be keeping young people inside their homes instead of outside at music festivals. “I do think there’s something to this particular cohort where the wounds — of the lockdown, the pandemic — have yet to heal,” said Will Page, former chief economist of Spotify.
Questions:
- Why are people spending less money up front to attend music festivals?
- How are generational differences impacting the live event industry?
Sources: Timothy Karoff, “‘We’re F–cked’: California’s Music Festival Bubble Is Bursting,” SFGate, Oct. 15, 2024; Greg Rosalsky and Wailin Wong, “The Year The Music Festival Died,” NPR Planet Money, Oct. 8, 2025.