Glastonbury Festival saw its turnover drop from £45m to less than £1m following the cancellation of the event in 2020.
In accounts for the year ending March 31 2021, the organisers of the world famous music and arts festival held at Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, recorded a loss of £3.1m after taxation, with turnover at £936,000
Sir Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamarr had been set to headline the Pyramid Stage in 2020, with Diana Ross playing the Sunday Legends teatime slot, before the Coronavirus pandemic forced the performances to be called off.
The event was again postponed last year, with the organisation staging a live stream event - Live at Worthy Farm - which featured sets from Coldplay, Michael Kiwanuka and Wolf Alice.
The directors of Glastonbury Festival Events Ltd said the company had been able to cover the significant losses incurred from the pandemic and the cancellation of the 2020 festival with a float of retained profits from previous years.
The organisation added that the float had enabled it to contribute to running costs during 2021 when the festival was cancelled for a second time, and that it would look to build the float back up for future events.
The board, which includes organisers Micheal and Emily Eavis, said that it was continuing to consider the risk posed by the pandemic to this year’s event, though plans were underway for it to take place in June.
The directors added that there was likely to be “significant costs” specifically related to Covid-19 measures and related issues.
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In April 2021 it was announced Glastonbury Festival would receive nearly £1m to help keep the organisation afloat following the pandemic, through the Government's Cultural Recovery Fund, which the Eavis family said would make “a huge difference” in securing the event’s future.
The accounts noted that ticket prices for the festival had been increased in 2019, in order to ensure sufficient profits after necessary expenses incurred during its "fallow" year in 2018, - held in mostly five-year intervals to give the land, local population and organisers a break - as well as payments to its core charities.
The organisation also organises two much smaller events, Pilton Party and Glastonbury Extravaganza. As well as the Live at Worthy Farm online event, the company diversified its revenue streams in 2021 with the assembling of a family campsite on the Glastonbury Festival site called Worthy Pastures.
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