“This year you are charging for tickets. What’s up with that?”
The Iron Bridge Music Festival is now in its 6th year. As the organizing committee looks to the future, we find ourselves at a crossroads. Do we continue to present the festival as a free event for the community, relying on business sponsors, periodic grants and sales from the beer garden, (which is usually sufficient to fund local and regional bands), or do we start charging a modest ticket price to give us the budget we need to bring national acts to New Cumberland? It is a question that we have considered and contemplated for two years.
This year we have decided to try the paid ticket option for several important reasons:
By relying so heavily on sponsors, it is very difficult to carry a budget surplus over from the previous year. We have no cushion, and can be liable for thousands of dollars if the weather doesn’t cooperate and sales from the beer garden tank.
If we can’t expand our budget through tickets, it is hard envisioning the festival growing in terms of improving the guests’ experience and the quality and diversity of the music. There is no way that we can bring bands like Locash, or 38 Special, or Bret Michaels, or Daryl Hall to New Cumberland Borough Park without selling tickets.
We value that this has always been a family-friendly event and are working on ways to keep it family-affordable. This year, for example, kids 12 & under, if accompanied by an adult, can get in for free.
It is our core belief that we can offer the live-music lovers of New Cumberland and the surrounding area a unique concert experience with amazing local, regional and national bands at way below market value pricing in an exceptional outdoor setting. If you have suggestions on how we can continue to improve this, we are all ears. We thank you for your support.
-The Iron Bridge Music Festival Planning Committee