Business counts cost of festival collapse
LOCAL businesses are counting the cost of the collapse of Kirkcaldy’s comedy festival.
Adrian Hewson, boss at The Sign Company which printed the programmes for the event, said he is out of pocket by over £1000 - and he hasn’t heard from the organisers or Kirkcaldy4All.
He said he only got involved because the BID company had backed the plans.
“If it hadn’t have been called the Kirkcaldy Comedy Festival and if it hadn’t been promoted by Kirkcaldy4All, then I wouldn’t have gone near it,’’ he said. “The fact it fronted it gave it a degree of credibility and that’s why we went with it.
“Kirkcaldy4All must hold a very large part of the responsibilty for what’s happened.’’
Mr Hewson says a complete collapse could have been avoided if Kirkcaldy4All had discussed its plans with the traders before pulling the plug.
“They could have come to us and said ‘look, this is what we are thinking of doing’ and there could have been a discussion about whether to go ahead - but all they did was just cancel it. I definitely would have been open to discussion to recoup the £1000 we have lost.”
Outlet
The festival’s main ticket outlet was in Blind Davy’s High Street shop.
A card machine was installed specifically to take payments for the tickets.
A spokesman for the shop said: “The card machine belonged to Kreative Destiny - we only collected the money for the tickets on their behalf.
“We did this as a big favour to help out the town and the comedy festival.
“All I can say is that we are exceptionally disappointed with how certain people have conducted themselves.
“It could’ve been so good for the town but it has just ended in a complete shambles.”
The shop does not expect to recoup money spent on sponsorship, tickets and advertising.
“It makes you wonder about getting involved in other things like this,’’ he added. “All I can say is that we’re out of pocket considerably. It’s just a big disappointment.’’
The shop also praised the support of Kirkcaldy4All, adding it had been kept up to date with developments.
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Weather for Kirkcaldy
Saturday 18 May 2013
Today
Heavy rain
Temperature: 9 C to 14 C
Wind Speed: 26 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Cloudy
Temperature: 9 C to 16 C
Wind Speed: 8 mph
Wind direction: East
