Pollstar: The bus, or “coach” as they’re referred to, business was hit as hard or harder than any other during the COVID lockdown, with usually empty lots now full of unused luxury coaches, parked with nowhere to go and no one to take to another next gig for an extended period.
And, like many other touring sectors, the coach industry has had its share of challenges getting back online and going from 0 to 100 after the complete shutdown of concert tours.
3 comments:
I remember last year a lot of the articles on here were about industries we maybe wouldn’t have considered were hit badly by the pandemic as a result of live entertainment being hit hard. The coach industry is definitely one that I did not consider until reading this article, but makes total sense that this industry had to be put on hold as tours were put on hold. But it is great that now it is picking up again and this company is sold out of their coaches right now. But this brings up good points that it is still scary to go on tour and people are on edge as they risk positive COVID cases going around the country. I am glad a lot of tours are requiring everyone to be vaccinated because they are living together and traveling together and working in such close contact with each other. And with the added testing that they seem to be requiring, it seems like they are trying to be as safe as they can be without not going on tour, so that is reassuring that hopefully everyone will be okay.
I really appreciate how positive these owners are. They have been hit with an incredibly difficult two years, especially with many drivers not wanting to get vaccinated. With incredibly niche businesses like this I can only imagine how terrifying it could be in a regular year let alone with a pandemic raging. But these people seem to really been troopers about the whole thing. I think that one of the most uplifting things in the entire world is to hear and see people who have been hit hard still have hope for the future. It makes you think that maybe humanity will survive, that we are good enough to survive. Additionally, I have never been on one of those fancy luxury buses but it looks so cool! The pictures make it look like it isn’t even a bus, it is a luxury Air BnB or something. These businesses are really putting in the work and I hope they are able to bounce back well and easily.
Yet another arts-adjacent industry I hadn’t thought about covid’s effect on until now. We all saw airlines and hotels struggling with the lack of travel, and obviously we know about the effect on performers, technicians, and venues, but I definitely hadn’t stopped to consider ‘what about the tour bus companies’. Touring seems so difficult right now with people living on busses in such tight conditions - we talk about what happens if someone on our show gets covid, but we don’t all live squeezed together constantly, which seems like a nightmare in terms of close contacts. It was nice to see that Prevost seems to have done a good job in terms of anticipating reopening and helping avoid at least one supply chain issue, which seems to be a running concern (the coach industry itself can be seen as a supply chain issue for the larger touring industry, so it’s interesting to see how specific it can get).
Post a Comment