Music Venue Trust (MVT), which represents hundreds of UK grassroots music venues has released its 2024 Annual Report, which once again raises concerns about the ongoing challenges facing the sector.
Despite highlighting positive activity including MVT celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2024, the continued success of Music Venue Properties, which has now secured freehold ownership of five grassroots music venues (GMVs), and the publication of a Culture, Media and Sport report which made strong recommendations to support grassroots music, the report indicates that significant work is still needed to prevent a continued decline of the sector.
A survey of the 810 members of the Music Venues Alliance (MVA), who employ over 30,000 people throughout the GMV community, found that they staged over 162,000 live music events comprising almost 1.5m individual artist performances given to a total audience of just under 20 million.
The total direct value to the UK economy from these events was £526m. However, on average, GMV’s (33% of which are now registered as not-for-profit entities) a 29% increase in not-for-profit registration since 2023 - operated on a profit margin of just 0.48% with 43.8% of them reporting a loss in the last 12 months. This means that the sector as a whole effectively subsidised live music activity to the tune of £162m.
One of the most concerning trends to have emerged from this report is the huge decline in locations on the UK’s primary and secondary touring circuits. In the past 30 years, those touring locations have collapsed, with an average tour in 1994 including 22 dates and the equivalent tour in 2024 consisting of only 11 dates.
Furthermore, touring in 1994 was spread across a range of 28 different locations across the country. In 2024, just 12 locations, all of them major cities, remained as primary and secondary touring circuit stops, acting as regular hosts to grassroots tours.