Blue Swede Shoes: Sweden market report – Part 2

IQ presents the second part of our Sweden market report, where we discover the festival market in particular is going through seismic changes. Catch up on part one here.

Festivals
If festivals are undergoing an identity crisis across the board, Sweden isn’t the kind of market to keep hammering an old formula.

Late last year, Live Nation confirmed that Lollapalooza Stockholm would “take a break” for ‘24 to give promoters time to “re-evaluate and make improvements across the board.” All Things Live’s Big Slap, which launched in 2013, announced its retirement the same month – with founder Ali Eftekhari telling the city’s Sydsvenskan newspaper it had reached its “maximum limit,” having grown from 15,000 capacity to 52,000 over a decade and welcomed the likes of Justin Bieber, Burna Boy, and Swedish House Mafia.

It has been a few years since FKP closed down Sweden’s then-biggest festival, Bråvalla, after a spate of sex attacks at its 2017 event, but the theme remains: this isn’t a country inclined to get sentimental about bygone good times if things are no longer working out.

“A normal year in Sweden, you could have between five and 15 stadium shows, and then you add in all the big festivals, but we are still only 9m people”

The ultimate issue, David Maloney suggests, is one of finite capacity: a small market can have stadium headline shows or blockbuster festivals, but it can’t easily have both.

“A normal year in Sweden, you could have between five and 15 stadium shows, and then you add in all the big festivals, but we are still only 9m people,” he says. “If you look at it that way, it makes sense that those big festivals will struggle.”

All Things Live’s solution has been to find a different way to play the game. “We do three festivals in Sweden, which are all sold out,” says Maloney, referring to the pop/hip-hop/house music-focused A Day In Lund, Varberg’s A Day At The Park, and Smögen’s Amaze.

“They are 8,500 capacity, but we only have domestic bands playing, we don’t have any international acts. In a way it’s a shame because you want to put the international bands on there, but the costs are double [what] a big Swedish headliner will cost. So our festivals are located in areas where there isn’t that much competition, and the size means you don’t have to spend a month building the set-up.”

If nothing is forever in the Swedish festival firmament, some old names do far better than others. Way Out West, in the 137-hectare Slottsskogen park in central Gothenburg, has run since 2007 and last year reported its highest-ever attendance, with 55,000 punters for three days of meat-free food, gender-balanced lineups (including Blur, Wizkid, Boy Genius, and Caroline Polachek last year, and Fred again.., PJ Harvey, André 3000, Big Thief, and Pulp in 2024) and circular, upcycled merch. The festival was ahead of its time and continues to appeal as the world catches up.

“Hard rock festivals have a steady business all the time. A large part of the audience goes to Sweden Rock every year – people plan their holidays around it”

Sweden Rock, meanwhile, demonstrated the trusty principle that old-school rock festivals are largely immune to the market’s mood swings, particularly in northern Europe, bringing Judas Priest, Alice Cooper, and Journey to southern Sweden across four days for a 35,000-cap crowd.

“Hard rock festivals have a steady business all the time,” says Pihlgren. “A large part of the audience goes to Sweden Rock every year – people plan their holidays around it.”

Newcomers, too, are finding worthwhile patches of ground to stake out. Rosendal Garden Party, which takes place on Djurgården island in central Stockholm each June, recently enjoyed its third year. The Cardigans, Nia Archives, and Grace Jones were among the attractions.

“Rosendal Garden Party is exceeding expectations,” says Borg. “Everyone knows that festivals are a costly endeavour that take many years [to build up]. Rosendal Garden Party is only in its third year and is already sending signals around northern Europe about how to create a world-class experience in a major city.”

Swedish hardcore legends Refused were also booked for what was to be their last-ever Swedish festival show, but their appearance was cancelled after frontman Dennis Lyxzén suffered a heart attack, from which he is now recovering.

The only certainty in Sweden, it seems, is more change, as the market figures out what it wants and promoters attempt to serve it up. And while genres come and go – with international country and hip-hop among the current defaults, particularly in the arena business – the proliferation of smaller, local, Swedish-centric festivals points to something else.

“Three years ago, we had three or four big EDM festivals, and now we don’t have any”

“Three years ago, we had three or four big EDM festivals, and now we don’t have any,” says Pihlgren. “What we do have is city festivals in most cities, some free, some ticketed. That’s maybe another effect of the pandemic – that people like to get together in their local area.”

Venues

In Stockholm this year, the theme at the top is change, but within established parameters. The 15,000-cap Avicii Arena is closed this year for a major upgrade, while the 50,000-cap Friends Arena (likewise part of ASM Global’s Stockholm Live group) is now Strawberry Arena, its new naming partner the 200-strong Nordic hotel chain.

“It is more than a name change on the Nordics’ largest arena, it is a new partnership established with Strawberry,” says the arena’s general manager Michael Yngvesson. “Time will tell, but sharing core values connected to hosting and experiences is a perfect starting point.”

As you would expect, 2024 has been a strong one for the stadium. “It is a fantastic year for us and Stockholm, and without the state-of-the-art venues we have, none of this would have been possible,” he says. “Taylor Swift was for sure something special and an honour to host at the arena. In total, we had over 178,000 guests visiting us to see the shows from 130 different countries – Bruce Springsteen held the old record of 167,000 from 2013.”

ASM Global has been in reshuffle mode, with Tobias Ekman joining as general manager for the four arenas in the Stockholm Globe District – including the Avicii Arena and the 30,000-capacity Tele2 Arena – and Yngvesson expanding his brief, which also includes his role as operations director, Nordics.

“Something we’ve seen over the past decade is a lot more Swedish acts that are making their way all the way up to arena and stadium level, which is very positive”

The Avicii Arena upgrade, funded via an investment of around €80m from its owner, the city of Stockholm, along with €20m from ASM Global, will deliver an entirely new rigging structure and new seat- ing and concourses, updating the 35-year-old venue for the rigours of modern tours while reusing the existing building.

“For ASM, that’s our go-to solution, when it’s feasible – always to invest in existing arenas,” says Marie Lindqvist, ASM Global SVP operations, Europe. “It is much more sustainable. And, of course, having the iconic arenas that we have in our portfolio, both in Sweden, with Avicii Arena, but also Wembley Arena etc, we’re very excited about the opportunities of investing to modernise and adapt.”

Tele2 Arena has flexed to take up some of the shows that might have gone to Avicii Arena. “We have developed a scaled-down version of Tele2 Arena, which has turned out very well for the promoters,” says Lindqvist. “Something we’ve seen over the past decade is a lot more Swedish acts that are making their way all the way up to arena and stadium level, which is very positive. We have had our first Swedish rap artist, Ant Wan, selling out Tele2 Arena, which is fantastic.”

Over at AXS, which tickets the Stockholm Live venues, Sietsema concurs. “Traditionally, international artists would do the stadium and arena tours, and the Swedish artists would do the club tours. But now we’re seeing the promoters taking bigger risks on traditional Swedish artists, putting them in arenas and selling well. And that’s probably something that goes up and down, depending on what artists you have, but it’s also good to see.”

The 8,100-cap Hovet and the 3,400-cap Annexet are also in the Stockholm Live portfolio, along with the Södra Teatern, a theatre venue with a capacity of up to 600, and Mosebacketerrassen, a rooftop terrace that can accommodate around 2,000.

Other key venues in Stockholm include legendary concert and club venue Debaser on the waterfront at Hornstull, where attractions for the remainder of the year include Nor- way’s Okay Kaya, Red Kross, Sleater-Kinney, and Real Estate.

Other notable venues include the Malmö Arena, which has a capacity of 13,000 for sports (predominantly ice hockey) and 15,500 for concerts, and of course, the Ullevi Stadium in Gothenburg, where, on the last of four nights in August 2022, local boy Håkan Hellström beat his own attendance record, with a crowd of 71,977. Laleh, Coldplay, Springsteen, and Metallica have visited since, but the record still stands.

Got Events manages the Ullevi, Scandinavium and Bravida arenas (14,000/6,330) and a number of other entertainment and sports facilities. Before Coldplay’s four sold-out concerts last year, it invested approximately SEK3.5m in modernising Ullevi’s solar cells. A 520m2 solar roof now delivers roughly 110 megawatt-hours a year.

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