I had major FOMO (Fear-Of-Missing-Out) for this year’s event, as the line-up of acts and activities along with some really innovative brand activations looked to cement this year as an unmissable weekend; and to ultimately position the festival as ‘the’ event of

the August Bank Holiday on an annual scale. So, I couldn’t quite believe my eyes as I saw chatter online from excited ticket-holders and artists quickly bubble into something very sour indeed on the opening Friday.

Despite best intentions, unforeseen circumstances can and do appear when organising a large public event. In these moments, it is crucial to adopt a flexible communications approach to manage stakeholder expectations as invariably circumstances will change at a heightened pace.

I could empathise with the press office team that were tasked with managing ticket-holder queries and negative commentary on social media, especially as references were made by users likening All Together Now to the controversial Fyre Festival (the faux-luxe festival which amassed failings of an incredulous level which Netflix captured on film earlier this year).

With some calls for the festival to be disbanded, remunerations sought by disgruntled attendees and other stakeholders reported being left in the dark; it is undoubtable that the event has faced significant reputation damage. I would like to think that the event can recover from this and to pledge to deliver a festival on par with its first year – of which all attendees were happy to provide third-party endorsements and encourage friends and family to go.