Coachella sends cease-and-desist to Mystic music festival Floatchella

“Floatchella,” a small, nonprofit music festival on the banks of the Mystic River, recently received a troubling piece of mail — a cease-anddesist order from AEG Worldwide, the organizer behind the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif.

Bruce Flax, President of the Greater Mystic Chamber of Commerce, said he was “taken aback” upon receiving a 17-page cease-and-desist letter for the Chamber's summer festival that draws a few hundred fans during the summer.

“When I got the letter from them, I think old Bruce would've freaked out but much more level-headed Bruce was like, ‘what are you going to do,'” Flax said. “It's a little demoralizing to us that we're just a non-profit and we're not touching the Coachella name at all. I don't think anyone is going to confuse us for Coachella.”

Flax said the Chamber was given seven days to change the name of their festival, which they since have. All references of “Floatchella” have since been scrubbed from the Chamber's website and any merchandise with the “Floatchella” name will no longer be sold, Flax said.

The interim name of the festival is “Floatfest.” Flax said that the Chamber is asking the community for suggestions for permanent names.

“Floatchella” was started in 2020 as a “pop-up paddle-craft only rally” on the Mystic River that boasts 300 paddle crafts in addition to people listening on land. The event spotlights local musicians from the area.

“The chamber was looking to do something that was outdoors and safe, and the downtown Mystic merchants weren't doing very well. So we were trying to bring more people into town,” Flax said. “We came up with this idea of putting musicians on floats that were tethered to docks.”

Coachella organizers have a history with legal action in relation to the California festival, including recently filing a lawsuit against its advisery

Live Nation for selling tickets through Ticketmaster to an event billed as “Coachella Day One 22.” The event had no relation to Coachella. According to Deadline, a judge ruled in favor of Coachella organizers and they were granted a temporary restraining order against the advertisers of the “Coachella Day One 22” while ticket sales for the event were also halted.

Flax said he talked to some attorneys and was advised that it would be tough to win against the live music giant. “A mistake” that Flax noted was that the original font for the “Floatchella” festival closely resembled the Coachella font.

“Wouldn't you look at Floatchella and kind of laugh and be like, ‘that's kind of funny, god bless,'” Flax expressing surprise that the Coachella organizers even took notice, adding that “a VIP ticket probably costs more than our whole festival did to put on.”

Flax says that this spotlight brought on by the cease-anddesist order only brings more attention to their festival by the water.

“It's giving our festival a little bit of publicity, which we could always use,” Flax said. “We're just going to put our head down, move forward and enjoy all of the great things that we're going to be doing this year.”

“Floatfest” will be held on Aug. 27 starting at 1 p.m. The event is free to the public.