By Rob Kelly
in association with
FESTIVAL SCENE IS MUSIC TO OUR EARS
OPEN FOR ENTRIES
NOW
ENTER NOW 5 December 2025
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Justin Timberlake, Lionel Richie, Diana Ross and Shania Twain have all flocked to the Fylde coast to take centre stage at the Lytham Festival. A major date on the national festival scene it brings tens of thousands of people to the town every year.
But it is not just music royalty that is boosting the county’s economy. Lancashire has a thriving festival scene with performers and international cultural Turner Prize winning names attracting visitors from across the globe.
Preston-based Skiddle, the UK’s leading independent event ticketing platform, listed 17 Lancashire festivals on its website this year. That accounts for seven per cent of the business’ overall market and puts the county in the top ten when it comes to festivals.
Duncan King, head of festivals at Skiddle, says there is a “real appetite for people to attend festivals and events.”
Much of that appetite comes from locals with festival-goers travelling an average distance of 20 miles to attend an event. He says: “As an area, people are really behind the local music scene.
“The county’s really supportive of the events. And when it comes to food traders and suppliers, there’s a plethora of amazing independent businesses to support so it is a very positive market.
“Larger commercial festivals are what bring people into a festival for the first time, because of bigger artists playing. But Lancashire has some great independent events that people come to after. There has to be that balance between the two.”
Justin Timberlake
From humble beginnings as a one-day Proms event with just 3,500 attendees, Lytham Festival has evolved into a five-day musical spectacle drawing more than 110,000 people annually.
Presented by Cuffe and Taylor, part of the Live Nation group, the festival has been a cornerstone of Lancashire’s cultural calendar since 2009.
Lytham Festival
walk through our gates and enjoy music, they come for the entire day, and often several days, which means they are spending money locally across the Fylde coast.”
The festival also has long-term tourism benefits. Peter says: “The beauty of the area also means many people who are initially drawn by the
People don’t tend to come to Lytham to just walk
through our gates and enjoy music, they come for the entire day, and often several days, which means they are spending money locally across the Fylde coast
Peter Taylor, its co-founder, says: “Everyone knows Lytham as a beautiful coastal town to visit throughout the year. It is also now internationally respected as a town that brings some of the best global music artists to perform there.
“People don’t tend to come to Lytham to just
festival then revisit the town at later dates for day trips or longer.”
The area also has other attractions including Lytham 1940s Weekend and the St Annes International Kite Festival, among others.
Latest figures from Marketing Lancashire show that festivals and events are responsible for
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TOURISM
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