Inside the Business of Coachella — How the SoCal Show Became America’s Top Festival

When Coachella debuted for the first time in 1999, the American music festival market was unrecognizable from what it is today. A smattering of touring festivals were already around, including Lollapalooza and Warped Tour, but there wasn’t much else. Plus, one of the biggest attempts at throwing a big American festival — Woodstock ’99, an attempt at recreating the magic of Woodstock in 1969 — had ended in disaster and three festival goer deaths earlier that year.

Coachella was far from a guaranteed hit, but Katie Bain, senior music correspondent, director of Billboard Dance and author of Desert Dreams: The Music, Style and Allure of Coachella, says that the festival based in Indio, Calif., was special from the start: “It was like this Eden, ostensibly, of palm trees and grass and bougainvillea in the desert…Talking to some [attendees] who were there, they said that from that first year, it felt as special as it still feels. It was different from the start.”

In the latest episode of Billboard‘s On the Record podcast, Bain speaks to host Kristin Robinson about the history and business that grew Coachella from a beloved local attraction to one of the biggest stages in the world. The wide-ranging conversation, released just ahead of Coachella’s weekend one, catalogs top performances from Beyoncé and Daft Punk, dissects why 60% of GA Coachella ticket buyers used a payment plan last year and explains why booking its lineup is a “gamble” every time.

Watch or listen to the full episode of On the Record below on YouTube, or check it out on other podcast platforms here.

Last year, journalist Dave Brooks wrote a story for Billboard, revealing that 60% of GA Coachella goers actually use a payment plan to pay for their ticket. It sparked a lot of conversations. What do you think that stat reveals about the festival?

It really got a lot of pickup. I remember seeing a story in The Cut after that being like, no one can afford to go to Coachella anymore. And it really turned into this thing; what does it mean about the youth and the economy? People were really hand-wringing about it, but I think that it’s a really smart way for people who don’t necessarily have $600 to spend in a given moment to make payments for six months and make that financial blow less impactful. It costs $41 to do the payment plan. And so it’s not like they’re charging crazy interest on it. It’s actually a pretty good deal. If you’re a young person who doesn’t make a lot of money, I don’t know why you wouldn’t do the payment plan.

It does feel like festivals, in general, are a good bang for your buck. Yes, it’s expensive, but there’s so much you can see.

Exactly. It’s like going to a great buffet.

To me, it feels like the 2010s were the peak for music festivals. There were so many new festivals popping up with all sorts of niches around the country. Is this my own perception, or have festivals had a harder time post-pandemic?

It has become a lot harder for independent festivals to exist. There’s a lot of competition for talent and it takes a lot of money to book artists. Radius clauses are a thing. Festivals are difficult because the margins are really thin. It’s very hard to make a profit with the festival. With Live Nation and AEG putting on these big events, a lot of independent promoters have been [struggling] — and I’m not blaming anyone because obviously a lot of things happened post-pandemic — but it’s really hard to throw an independent festival. A lot of small ones have gone away.

You mentioned a radius clause. Can you explain what that is for someone who doesn’t know?

A radius clause is basically a clause in a contract that an artist signs when they sign up to play a festival or event, promising that they’re not going to play in — let’s say as an example — a 200-mile radius around that event for three months before, three months after, or whatever the time span is. Coachella’s is considered particularly strict, but they have to protect that event. It’s a lot of money to put a show on like that. If you have a headliner that’s playing a show nearby two months before Coachella, that’s going to devalue your event.

Coachella’s this year is reportedly from Dec. 15 to May 1, although it varies every year, but that basically means all of Southern California is off limits for half of a year — that sounds like a big deal for most artists.

It is. As far as I’ve heard, this actually could be a bigger issue for younger artists — the ones whose bread and butter is touring — because that’s how you’re making money. [You have to ask yourself] is it worth it to play Coachella if you are not able to make the touring money that you would have if you didn’t? I think it’s really an equation that a lot of emerging acts have to figure out. Of course, you can have a breakout moment in Coachella. It’s a big platform, but it can also be a little bit of a roll of the dice.