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erry and I graduated, and Jon quit JazzFest to work on Superfly full time. We operated almost like a socialist regime. Every month, each one of us

Mayers: We had to program creatively, because the competition was tough. Clear Channel was rolling up independent concert promoters, which gave it a lot of clout with musicians' agents. House of Blues had its own performance venues, so it could hang on to all the merchandise and concession sales. We couldn't. In 2001, 10 shows in a row lost money. We'd hit the ceiling financially and creatively and needed a new direction.

Farman: The jam scene, which was our specialty, was also at a crossroads. Jerry Garcia was dead, and Phish was on hiatus. Bands were starting to figure out the Internet. Part of it was the whole Grateful Dead ethos of tape trading. So all of a sudden, bands are realizing, This is a way I can communicate with my audience, and the fans are realizing, This is a way I can access music. We wanted to build on those existing communities.

Graph on BR and OL - immersion - jetblue, etc With an estimated annual gross in the $25 million range and attendance at more than 80,000 (the vast majority of whom stays on-site for the entire four-day run), Bonnaroo is arguably the most immersive major U.S. music festival and a perennial sellout

Sustainability - bworks, solar panels, etc.

Outside Lands also brings together the Bay Area's finest restaurants and food trucks, with curated areas including "Outside Lambs," "Choco Lands," and – new this year – "Cheese Lands." There is also a sizable wine festival within the festival ("Wine Lands") as well as a beer fest ("Beer Lands"), all of which create an immersive experience inside Golden Gate Park for the three days that the festival calls it home

one of the country’s premier festivals, with a hug-your-neighbors culture and an immersive environment

solar power Over the years, has been highly praised for its diversion of more than 3 million pounds of waste from landfills through its recycling and composting program - 296,000 pounds of which is the result of using Eco-Products' compostable cutlery and serving ware throughout the festival. Bonnaroo becomes first major US festival to install permanent solar array

Festival organizers said in a written statement they expect the array, comprised of 196 SolarWorld panels, will generate 61,000 kilowatt hours per year -- the equivalent of about 20 percent of the festival's power needs.

Bonnaroo will also be selling its renewable energy to the Tennessee Valley Authority power grid.

In November, Bonnaroo announced that for the sixth consecutive year it was a recipient of “A Greener Festival Award” in recognition of its ongoing and extensive sustainability initiatives. Bonnaroo is the only six-time U.S. recipient of “A Greener Festival” award, an internationally recognized independent scheme for environmentally aware festivals which is available for events throughout Europe, North America and Australia.

food recovery program in partnership with the Grundy County Food Bank. We collected 6,500 pounds of food from one of our two back-of-house catering areas. include both of our back-of-house catering areas as well as every food vendor on The Farm. The recovery program collected over 29,000 pounds of food in 2015. volunteer special impact by supporting the Food Bank with repairs for their refrigerated truck

bonnaroo works fund Bonnaroo Works Fund will grant nearly $300,000 in support to well-vetted, nonprofit organizations that are working to advance music and the arts, education and environmental causes. 'waste management diverted 67% of our waste by weight in 2015

Well Dunn, a program to support young professionals in search of internships and careers in the entertainment business, has launched. The program's mission is to support the aspirations of inspired up-and-comers who want to work in entertainment but lack the necessary resources to take on an internship.

Capshaw went for it (he and Capps retain stakes in Bonnaroo), and rumors promptly began circulating online, where jam fans already had an intricate network of sites and blogs for exchanging tour dates, bootlegs, and show reviews. Sensing that cultish, post-Phish types would perform the promotional legwork on their own, Superfly went so far as to pocket its $100,000 advertising budget, bypass Ticketmaster, and throw the tickets up for sale on its Web site. By the end of the day, it had sold more than 10,000 tickets by word of mouth alone; a couple of weeks later, it hit 70,000. It had hoped to sell 40,000.

Between the municipal resources it pays for (the festival reimburses all medical, fire and police overtime pay), the commerce it brings in and the temporary jobs it creates, the festival enriches Coffee County to the tune of more than $20 million annually.

In 2006, Bonnaroo grossed $14.7 million in ticket sales alone, and the following year, AC and Superfly acquired 530 of the festival site's 700 acres — dubbed Great Stage Park — for, according to Billboard, $8.7 million. Farman says the purchase allowed him and his colleagues to invest in long-term infrastructure.

"Our entire promotion

or the people behind Superfly, a New York-based company with separate event production and marketing divisions, the answer would be all of the above. But the way to really build the business lies with No. 3. This weekend, Superfly produces one of its main events, the two-day Outside Lands festival held in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park featuring around 45 bands, a dozen DJs, and integrated product promotions for Heineken, Odwalla, Sony Ericsson, Toyota, Intel, and more.

Rick Farman began promoting concerts at the age of 17 at small clubs in New York City. While attending Tulane University, he was Promotions Manager at Tipitina’s, New Orleans’ legendary nightclub.

The company got its start in 1997, the brainchild of a group of college friends, most of whom were going to Tulane University and hanging out at Tipitina’s, the well-known music venue in New Orleans. Their first real entry to the music business was to create side events surrounding the city’s annual Jazz & Heritage Festival, which led them to create Bonnaroo—a music festival about 60 miles outside of Nashville that sold out its 70,000-run of tickets the first year without any traditional advertising.

Bonnaroo, held each June, is billed as North America’s largest music festival and now spans over four days. Companies that want to take part pay anywhere from the “mid five figures up into seven figures” for customized opportunities, said Superfly co-founder Rich Goodstone. Some examples: AT&T sponsoring a digital music village where festivalgoers could download custom playlists, Odwalla running contests on Facebook and giving out free samples, and Gibson Guitars getting 20,000 people to sign up on site for a guitar giveaway.

Goodstone, who heads the Superfly Marketing Group, talked with Portfolio.com about the privately held company, the value of marrying entertainment with product promotion, and the concept of experiential marketing. Joining him at Superfly’s offices near Washington Square Park on the edge of the New York University campus was Jonathan Azu, who works for the marketing division. Following is an edited transcript of our conversation:

Superfly is an American entertainment and marketing company. Bonnarroo an Outside Lands

a pioneering festival producer which has become increasingly active in the branding space by strategically helping brands navigate the cultural marketing landscape through programming, design, digital, social and experiential platforms.

On June 20, 2002, Superfly co-founders Jonathan Mayers and Richard Goodstone, along with partners Rick Farman and Kerry Black, were decidedly small-time players on the national live-music scene. Four days and 80 bands later, the sold-out inaugural Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival in Manchester, Tenn. (produced in partnership with Ashley Capps' AC Entertainment and backed by Red Light Management founder Coran Capshaw) brought them into the big leagues, shepherding the event that, along with Coachella, jump-started the festival scene that has become a cornerstone of the North American music business.

With an estimated annual gross in the $25 million range and attendance at more than 80,000 (the vast majority of whom stays on-site for the entire four-day run), Bonnaroo is arguably the most immersive major U.S. music festival and a perennial sellout. Launched at the height of the jam band boom, it has long transcended its hippie roots by presenting such acts as Paul McCartney, Metallica, Bruce Springsteen and Kanye West, along with Billy Joel, Mumford & Sons, My Morning Jacket and Deadmau5, who will headline the event June 11-14. Adweek RFID http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/brands-go-digital-extended-sponsorships-music-festivals-158873

For now, Bonnaroo's best hope for growth is monetizing what Farman calls its "curatorial voice" - Companies like Budweiser, Ford, Canon, and the Cartoon Network shell out top dollar for facetime with Bonnaroo's audience of tastemaking college kids and affluent young professionals. Still, the marketing presence is muted compared with other festivals. There's Bud Light in the VIP tent and Ben & Jerry's new Bonnaroo Buzz flavor in the freezers, but the promoters strive to keep signage to a minimum and have resisted selling naming rights for stages or the festival. "They could do double what they're doing, easy," Waddell says. "But they're real careful about it." It seems to be paying off: In last year's tumbling economy, when high gas prices and tight wallets brought down all other sources of revenue, sponsorships for the festival actually rose. Bonnaroo is famously thrifty. Organizers keep expenses in-house as much as possible, handling advertising through the newly launched Superfly Marketing Group and ticketing through their own website. As with any festival, the biggest expense is tale

Original focus on jam bands. Two years hadd gained credibility with jam bands and fans - put together concerts over 8 nights 28 bands in 8 venues raning from capacity more than 15000 were sold in one day - slate a string of shows together in tourist firiendsly new orleans and people will come print ads alt weeeklies jam bands internet savvy - gained national credibiility by superjam with trey anastasio stuart copeland les claypool -oysterhead nationnal cred sold out in minutes "superfly was there for all these bands so conseuently they have all these bands that work with them started shows at 2 AM after previous shows to satisfy  demand from bands that wanted to play during jazz fest - 25 citis ad buys 40 marketing reps in 50 cities

Dirty Dozen Brass Band 25th anniversary 11 night stand at mermaid promoted via internet 35 shows 40,000 people

Superfly's Food Obsession Food

he partners at Superfly Presents (the guys behind San Francisco's Outside Lands, Tennessee's Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival and the Superfly During Jazzfest Series) believe excellent food, great wine and world-class music belong together.

"I've eaten too many soggy chicken tenders at shows. There's no excuse," says Kerry Black, the most food-fixated Superfly member. He travels the globe seeking amazing music and food combinationsbeef satay after a rare performance by Painkiller at Holland's North Sea Jazz Festival; Hog Island oysters with My Morning Jacket at Outside Lands. Black's goal at Outside Lands is for the food and wine to be as big a draw as the music. Highlights this year: Arcade Fire, Farmerbrown's Little Skillet catfish po'boys, Namu's Korean tacos and the Wine Lands tent.

they were a bunch of scruffy kids promoting shows in the bleary, steamy bars and clubs of New Orleans. Superfly made its name in the late 1990s by throwing all-night concerts for the legions of collegians who annually descend there for Jazz Fest. The vibe was gritty, spontaneous, and wholly authentic; musicians from different bands would jam together at shows that started at 2 a.m. and raged until sunrise. Soon, people were flocking to Jazz Fest as much for Superfly's after-hours scene as for the daytime festival itself. "Those shows put Superfly on the map," says Tom Chauncey, the president of Partisan Arts and booking agent for Ben Harper and Jack Johnson. "You would simultaneously call to place your act in Jazz Fest and in one of Superfly's nighttime shows." From 1997 to 2000, Superfly hit its stride; its yearly gross, it says, skyrocketed from around $200,000 to more than $1 million.

But without its own venue to collect the bar revenue—a critical profit center for promoters—Superfly took a pummeling from corporate giants such as the House of Blues. By 2001, the operation had already plateaued. So the gang hit on the idea for Bonnaroo: "We didn't have an amphitheater," recalls Jonathan Mayers, the quartet's prickly strategist, now 32. "So we went to a farm."

It cobbled together a business plan (paying its accountant with concert tickets), hooked up with Ashley Capps, a regional promoter in Tennessee, and pitched the idea to Coran Capshaw, the powerful manager of the Dave Matthews Band.

At the same time, however, the quartet has begun producing in-house gigs for the likes of Microsoft, Aventis Pharmaceuticals, Anheuser-Busch, and music apostates MTV2. Arguably, Superfly has used those gigs to help keep Bonnaroo itself relatively pu Fast Co 2006

Superfly is an entertainment and lifestyle company with offices in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago. They are co-creators of Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, as well as Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival and Great GoogaMooga.

History
The company was founded in 1996 by Jonathan Mayers, Rick Farman, Richard Goodstone and Kerry Black.

After gaining notoriety as hosts of after-hours events during the New Orleans Jazz Fest and Mardi Gras, Superfly's owners realized they had hit a plateau, unable to compete with big venues that could profit from alcohol and other sales in addition to ticket fees. They wanted to put on bigger events and came up with the idea of Bonnaroo.

Bonnaroo
Superfly's approach to the first Bonnaroo during the summer of 2002 was notable for a number of reasons. The venue was remote. The bands were not chart toppers, and most remarkably, promotion was entirely done on the internet, with tickets only being available through their own website (a unique business concept at the time). The manager of Dave Matthews Band came on as an initial backer, simultaneously guaranteeing a headline act. Word of mouth drove 10,000 ticket sales in the first day of availability, and 70,000 total in 11 days. They had hoped to sell 40,000. To this day, Bonnaroo tickets are exclusively available through the company's website, and the festival has grown to be one of the world's largest musical events of the year every year.

Bonnaroo has sold out almost every year since the first festival was held in 2002, and in 2007 Rolling Stone magazine named the festival one of "50 moments that changed the history of rock."

As a result of a partnership between Ben & Jerry's and the Bonnaroo festival, the ice cream company created a “Bonnaroo Buzz” flavor in 2011.

The festival used their YouTube channel Bonnaroo365 to get the help of fans in selecting the 2013 lineup by having them submit videos promoting bands they’d like to see.

Outside Lands
Superfly co-created the San Francisco-based Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival. Launched in 2008, it was the first major ticketed event in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. While bands are a major attraction for the crowds, the event also leverages San Francisco’s local culture with involvement from regional restaurants and wineries providing interesting fare as well as tech companies and non-profit groups adding their own touches like a live broadcast on YouTube and free water bottle refills and bike valet for the environmentally conscious crowd.

Great GoogaMooga
In 2012 Superfly launched its culinary festival brand, the Great GoogaMooga: a festival that highlights food above music, which debuted in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park in May 2012. The first major food festival of its kind, GoogaMooga emphasizes the culinary experience and works with local sustainable businesses and well known chefs to create an event with quality food as the main attraction. Though the festival's emphasis is on food, it also features acts by a number of prominent bands.

Superfly Marketing Group
Superfly Marketing Group, also referred to as SMG, was created in 2009 to be a strategic partner to brand marketers. SMG has developed marketing programs for JetBlue, Intel, Life is good, and Adult Swim, both at Superfly-produced festivals, as well as standalone marketing programs. Billboard Staff. Video: Superfly Presents' Rick Farman Talks Bonnaroo, Outside Lands, Interactive Festival Experiences @ FutureSound. Billboard, November 18, 2011. http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/1160038/video-superfly-presents-rick-farm