Where it all went wrong for big-name Wiston Summer Sounds concert series

Low sales on days two and three, the wrong artists on days two and three and also soaring infrastructure costs left him no option but to pull the plug on the series, says Worthing-based Thom Milner-Smith, of Atom Presents. Lined up were Craig David, Katherine Jenkins, Russell Watson, Soft Cell, ABC and Heaven 17 for the open-air series at Wiston Park Estate from Friday, September 8-Sunday, September 10. There was talk of moving Craig David and Katherine Jenkins to Brighton venues instead, but it couldn’t be made to work: “They're all fantastic artists and it was my choice to put them on, at the wrong time and announce them far too late. We got the artists for days two and three wrong. It was my decision and also I just didn't appreciate how big the infrastructure costs would be. We thought that the infrastructure costs based on similar events for three days would be £200,000 but actually it rose to more than £300,000 approaching the event. It was staff costs and also the site was quite remote so we had to have car parking on site and obviously there was staff for that as well with marquees and all these other things. I think I was just too optimistic but also I should have booked sooner. We did have a June date pencilled in and we moved that but then maybe September is the wrong time because it is outside of summer touring. I think you need at least a year to be selling the tickets. For someone like Robbie Williams you would sell out in a month but actually even with Robbie Williams it might be difficult if he was doing something like 50 gigs that year. That’s another consideration that you need to have.”

Thom defended his ticket pricing with all the gigs under £50. Some people criticised the fact that he was charging for parking but Thom says it is fairly common: he looked around and saw other venues were charging £10 or £12. He was charging £6.

Potentially Thom might attempt to put on something similar again, but not before 2025: “But I do think the focus would be on permanent venues which is so much more attractive in terms of risk because so much is already there.” He might also consider Wiston again: “But Wiston is a very large site. If we were to do it again I think we would have to increase the capacity and also the size of the artists because of the infrastructure costs. We now know that 6000 capacity is not necessarily enough. Most open-air events start at 10,000 capacity. We were too small, too late, and the wrong choice of artists on the second and third days. As I say all the artists are fantastic. It was up to me to put them in the right place at the right time.”

Thom been encouraged by a couple of sold-out gigs recently: “If this was just a one-off festival and I was never coming back then I would feel a lot worse than I do but we will come back. I could come up with a hundred reasons why it didn't work but the only person I'm going to blame is myself for making those choices.

"Some of those choices turned out not to be the right choices and I'm just going to have to think about what I would change and what I would do differently. Wiston Estate Park is a beautiful site in the South Downs National Park, which hosts remarkable events all summer. At the right time, an open-air concert series would definitely work.”