Plans to relaunch a more financially resilient, multi-venue Cambridge Folk Festival have been submitted to the city council and are set to be voted on next Tuesday (15/07).

This relaunch follows a loss-making festival in 2024 which resulted in a deficit of £320,000, raising “immediate concerns about the festival’s financial resilience”.

The Cambridge Folk Festival first took place in 1965, and reportedly attracts around 14,000 annual attendees. After the significant financial loss in 2024, largely because of rising infrastructure costs and reduced revenue, significant financial subsidy from the council was required.

In 2025, following recommendations, the festival took a strategic pause, or a “fallow year,” which allowed for a comprehensive review of the festival by the city council’s staff and specialist consultants. Audiences, experts in the festival sector, and local folk clubs have also been consulted in the formulation of these plans.

The new proposal maintains Cherry Hinton Hall as the Folk festival’s anchor venue, still hosting “key performances” and preserving familiarity for its “long-standing audiences”.

However, the review pointed out that there would be no way to relaunch this traditional four-day Festival at Cherry Hinton Hall without the council accepting significant financial risk. This would potentially involve the council providing the event with a £0.5 million annual subsidy, at a time when the council is already having to find annual savings of £11.5 million.

The recommendation is therefore to reduce the event to a two-day festival at Cherry Hinton Hall, with two medium-sized stages and more basic camping provisions, aiming to reduce the festival’s costs. Additional venues across the city would also host folk events throughout the week, providing “greater flexibility, accessibility, and inclusion”.

The review stated that this multi-venue format has proven to be very successful for other festivals including the Celtic Connections in Glasgow, the Brighton Festival, and Edinburgh’s Fringe festival, reportedly demonstrating the “viability of a distributed venue format to enhance audience experience, inclusion and financial sustainability”.

Cabinet Member for Culture, Economy and Skills, Councillor Antionette Nestor, said: “We’re really optimistic about the potential of a multi-venue format that balances the tradition of Cherry Hinton Hall with new opportunities to appeal to a broader audience and support local cultural partners.”

Nestor also stated: “The council cannot afford to subsidise the Festival by half a million pounds a year in the long-term, so we need to address the changes in audience behaviour – such as the decline in people wanting to pay for weekend camping tickets – and ensure the Festival returns in a financially resilient way.’

This proposal is set to be voted and decided upon by members of the council’s Cabinet at a meeting next Tuesday (15/07).