How Ultra Europe Made Things Right After Weather Cancellation

Mother Nature can be a music festival’s worst nightmare. We saw that last year with the disastrous handling of torrential downpours at TomorrowWorld in the southern United States. The team at Ultra Europe almost had catastrophe on their hands after inclement weather forced a Day 1 cancellation.

Rather than force the performances to continue under unsafe circumstances, the festival opted to put safety first. It would be dangerous to perform in storms, and would be a risk to fans as well. Many fans do not realize this through their original anger, but Ultra made the right choice.

What happens after a cancellation is crucial, and Ultra showed poise under pressure. Fans clamored for updates after a Facebook post stated they “had to temporarily delay the opening,” but a bunch of updates that basically say “there’s still a delay” would be pointless. The cancellation came about five hours after the original delay.

To make up for the cancellation, the festival announced that Friday tickets would be cross-honored for Saturday and Sunday. That effectively made a one day ticket into a two-day ticket. But people still complained that Ultra did not have a solution for three-day passes immediately. Should they have had a contingency plan? Probably. Does whining about it on Facebook help? No. The festival said that a solution for three-day passes will be announced. Relax, they won’t leave it unresolved because that’s how you lose fans. Refunds are the most likely outcome.

The festival went out of their way to re-book three acts to play early in Day 2. Armin van Buuren, Above & Beyond and Fedde le Grand all stayed in Split to play early in the day. Ultra showed their dedication to attendees with that move. Those three acts are fan favorites.

While it wasn’t handled as smoothly as it could have been, Ultra Europe did a fantastic job in turning around a poor situation.