Symphotech at Lockdown Festival
Lockdown Festival welcomed a sell out crowd of 7,000 dance music lovers to the grounds of the majestic Powderham Castle, Exeter, and saw performances from Tinie Tempah, Katy B and Stormzy.
Organisers, UK Live, called upon Symphotech, with relatively short notice, to help them deal with specific challenges before and during the event, including the 16+ age restriction and concerns from the Police and Licensing Authorities around the drug culture associated with the genre of music.
As soon as they were contracted the Symphotech team’s first priority was to establish effective communications to create a series of measures to mitigate the risks with all of the stakeholders. Medical and welfare facilities onsite were upgraded and robust counter-drug policies were put in place, which included the use of drug detection dogs, heightened searching of festival-goers on entry to both the campsite and the festival site, and amnesty bins were used to good effect. A no re-entry policy was implemented to counteract the movement of drugs and alcohol on and off the site.
The Symphotech team was onsite throughout the event to oversee all aspects of health and safety, managing the multiple policies and procedures in place, ever ready to respond quickly to any challenges as they arose.
Symphotech director Will Hodgson commented: “It was great to get to work alongside UK Live for the inaugural Lockdown Festival, and it’s fantastic to see organisers placing such a high importance on the safety of their attendees, and proactively investing in and taking significant steps to ensure their event was as safe as it can be. The festival had a great atmosphere and was a big success. Now we’ve gained a feel of the event, we’ve already identified additional areas where we could make further enhancements to improve the safety, and we look forward to working with UK Live in the future to positively affect audience welfare and overall experience.”
Nick Billinghurst, director at UK Live commented: “Working with the team from Symphotech is a breath of fresh air. Not only do they really know their stuff they have a great balance between the necessary authority required and the building of a whole work force attitude. They build to confidence of all those around, listen and interact appropriately where required. They are people that you really want on board when those difficult questions arise and you need to implement a strategy. They impressed us last year we have brought them back to all of our events for 2017 and increased their management remit within that so I can concentrate on my job of promoting my shows.”