Belladrum proves a real family success
IT HAS been described as the Highland Glastonbury, and now the multi-million pound economic pound importance of the Belladrum Tartan Heart music festival, near Beauly, has been established.
Some 17,000 attended this year’s event in August, 3,500 of whom were children.
A consultants’ report commissioned by the festival organisers shows the Highland economy benefited by £4.6 million, with £6.6m the wider Scottish figure. Meanwhile, employment at the event translated into the equivalent of 44 full-time jobs in the local economy and 66 in Scotland as a whole.
The report from Inverness-based Mackay Consultants, estimatesvisitors spent about £3.3m over the weekend, averaging about £246 per adult including £100 on their event ticket. The second highest spend was on on-site food and drink, accounting for 22.6 per cent of the total and approximately £750,000.
Belladrum, which gets its name from the Highland estate that hosts the event, has become Scotland’s second outdoor music festival after T In The Park in terms of size, prestige and importance in the Scottish cultural calendar, according to the report.
It continues: “However, while ‘T’ remains principally a 16-30-year-olds’ festival, Belladrum appeals to a family audience as it always has, from babes in arms to grannies in their eighties, and everyone else in between.
“Its esoteric range of musical genres – from Celtic through mainstream rock and indie to roots, jazz dance and classical – and its catholic coverage of the arts besides music – theatre, street theatre, installation art, literature, poetry, debate, performance art, children’s entertainment and much else besides – make Belladrum resemble a smaller version of Glastonbury north of the Highland line.”