Saturday, November 10, 2012
Hurricane Sandy to Cost Live-Entertainment Business Millions in Lost Profits, Expenses
Billboard.biz: With an ever-increasing number of live events being cancelled or postponed as Hurricane Sandy nears the Eastern Seaboard, stakeholders in the live entertainment industry are reviewing their insurance policies and contemplating big losses in marketing and promotion expenses and lost or delayed profits.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
This article was written before Sandy impacted New York, and it raises the question in hindsight of how those "one time producers" mentioned in the article made it. It's quite apparent that hurricane Sandy did some serious damage to NYC, and any shows scheduled for that weekend were not only cancelled, but it's to be assumed that many small (and even large) venues were flooded or are dealing with external damage. The damage the hurricane did on the live entertainment industry doesn't seem apparent at first glance, but those small producers and tiny venues and indie bands and who rely on each show to produce a profit or else they're deep in the red are probably doing not so good right now. Sandy must have cancelled an amount of shows lasting for about a week. A whole week without shows can seriously hurt those bands economically, and hopefully they'll be able to "ride out the storm" so to speak, but my fear is that this storm seriously damaged a lot of upcoming performance artists. It just goes to show that insurance is pretty crucial to have even for smaller artists if possible.
I wonder if major companies like Live Nation budget into their overall budget absorbing hits like this or if it is done show by show. I understand that some shows have insurance for this type of event but I wonder what the determining factors are for insuring a production against this type of situation. Also in regards to the smaller shows affected I wonder how many of them were damaged enough to close the production. Damage to the theatre buildings should be covered by insurance but I wonder if the scenery and equipment is covered by the venue's insurance or if these companies are just SOL.
it shouldn't happened. Harricane belongs to the kind of natural power, it is an un-avoidable power. Government should have some policy for this. they shouldn't let the company take the lose of money and heal tha damage by themself. at least their should be some extra help, except the part that covered by insurance.
I am curious to know what kind of insurance the theaters are able to get to cover for incidents like this. I disagree very strongly with JT, however. It is by no means the government's responsibility to cover loss of profits for private businesses. That is what businesses have insurance for. Those businesses should also be planning for events like this. Sandy is certainly not the first hurricane to hit the East Coast, though it is the worst to hit in recent times, and hurricanes are not the only weather-related closings that businesses have. Blizzards and Nor'easters shut down NYC often enough, and those businesses should have plans in place. There was also plenty of warning about Sandy for businesses to prepare a plan for the situation. In the case of Sandy, the government should be concerning itself with public transportation, government relief agencies, and helping the people of the city, not with lost profits from private businesses. As a tax-paying citizen of this country, I would be furious if the government were using my tax money to pay lost profits to private businesses while people living in the city were without electricity, and some had lost their homes and their entire livelihoods.
Post a Comment