If you thought Fyre Festival was over, think again. Well, technically the 2017 Fyre Festival ended on Friday after what the organizers deem "an unacceptable guest experience." But that's not the last you'll see of the luxury fest that promised "a blend of music, art and food" in the Bahamas. According to an email sent by the organizers on Saturday morning, Fyre Festival 2018 is happening, and they're promising free VIP passes to the 2017 attendees. Here's an excerpt from the statement:
All festival goers this year will be refunded in full. We will be working on refunds over the next few days and will be in touch directly with guests with more details. Also, all guests from this year will have free VIP passes to next year’s festival.
And if you do decide to give the festival a second chance, it seems like they're doing everything they can to ensure it's nowhere near as disastrous as the first — including hiring more experts and swapping the location. As the statement, signed "From Billy and the Fyre Festival Team," explains,
After speaking with our potential partners, we have decided to add more seasoned event experts to the 2018 Fyre Festival, which will take place at a United States beach venue.
It's unclear whether people will actually want to give the festival another go, but the organizers sound hopeful, adding that people in the music industry have reached out to help make the festival a reality next year.
As for what happened, the team is apologizing, taking responsibility, and working "tirelessly" to make things right. They stated,
The team was overwhelmed. The airport was jam packed. The buses couldn’t handle the load. And the wind from rough weather took down half of the tents on the morning our guests were scheduled to arrive. This is an unacceptable guest experience and the Fyre team takes full responsibility for the issues that occurred.
A quick look through the #FyreFestival tag on social media should give you an indication of what exactly went down. Memes flooded Twitter, even comparing the event to the Hunger Games.
Only time will tell whether the festival's apologies are enough to win people over and really make the 2018 event a hit.
