Attendees zip line over the main stage at the Rock in Rio USA festival site in Las Vegas. (Photo by Alivephotography)
What does it take to transplant one of the world’s biggest music festivals to the Las Vegas strip? Well, it helps to have huge headliners like Taylor Swift, Metallica and Bruno Mars.
That was the plan for the inaugural Rock in Rio USA festival in Vegas which took place over May 8-9 and May 15-16. The four-day, $75-million event drew more than 82,000 fans for the first “rock” weekend and another 90,000 for the second weekend, which was focused on pop stars including Ed Sheeran and Jessie J.
“It was a big bet because we didn’t know whether the American audience would enjoy the Rock in Rio concept,” said Roberta Medina, executive VP of Rock in Rio USA. “The big challenge was to tell people what we were preparing for them. Communication in this country is very complex because so much of the media is very local. Even doing all the investment we did to make people understand what we were preparing required a lot of media, so I’m sure some people came without knowing what they would find.”
But, she added, the fest ended up drawing fans from 47 of the 50 states, with 18 percent of the attendees coming in from overseas, representing 32 countries, one-third of whom were from the fest’s home country of Brazil.
The open-air City of Rock featured cultural experiences.
As is customary with Rock in Rio, the 30-year-old festival set up an open-air City of Rock (on the Las Vegas Strip), which gave fans a cultural experience as well as a musical one, including some traditional musical acts from Brazil, the U.S. and England on three themed Rock Streets.
What patrons found was a custom-built venue spread out over a permanent, $25-million, 40-acre outdoor site with underground cabling and permanent sewage lines. “It was beautiful to see their reaction when they entered the City of Rock,” Medina said. “They were not expecting that at all.” Before the event, producers and financial partners MGM Grand Resorts, Cirque du Soleil and the Yucaipa Co. did not hide their ambitions for the North American kick-off.
“For a brand new venue, there were no major hiccups,” said MGM Grand Resorts International Senior VP of Entertainment Chris Baldizan. “They set the bar pretty high for a live music festival in Las Vegas and the atmosphere was unbelievable and the crowd had an amazing time.”
And though daily capacity was about 85,000, Medina said the partners were happy with the first-year attendance numbers, which broke down to 37,000 and 45,000 for the first weekend and 42,000 and 48,000 on the second. “It would be magic to have the first edition sold out, but we did pretty good,” Medina said of the loss-leader first effort, which RIR hopes to build on for the already scheduled 2017 and 2019 editions.
Tapping into the increasingly interactive nature of American music fests, RIR had three ziplines that took attendees swinging past the main stage, permanent toilet facilities, plenty of artificial grass to walk and lie down on and even an inflatable wedding chapel with its own resident Elvis impersonator.
Baldizan said that once people walked into the venue you could see the “wow factor” light up their faces. “With the location right on Las Vegas Boulevard, you could walk from your room, take a cab, hop on the monorail, or take a shuttle that we provided, and when you got there it wasn’t just a parking lot, but this great turf throughout the property that created a community,” he said.
With its emphasis on permanent infrastructure and comfort, Medina was not surprised that the first-year attendees skewed older (36+). The goal now is to continue marketing the U.S. edition of RIR like the original South American ones, by focusing on the experience as much as the headline talent.
“I wasn’t sure how it would go with the layout and the flow we had and I was nervous about people getting to Rock Street because it was so different from the stages, but once you got there it really felt like you were in a city and hanging out with people and having a drink with them in this amazing scene you don’t often see in Las Vegas,” Baldizan said.
The 40-acre festival site in Las Vegas. (Photo by Alivephotography)
In addition, he said he heard many positive comments about the permanent facilities and the lavish, two-story, 4,000-capacity VIP structure which patrons said was like nothing they’d seen before at a festival. Baldizan said the structure looked so permanent, it was difficult to get a temporary structure permit. Fans also seemed to appreciate the in-and-out privileges that were not prominently advertised, but which allowed patrons to go to their hotel rooms and change or grab a bite.
Medina said there were no major surprises during the course of either weekend, though from the first to second day, organizers had to shuffle the traffic plan because they realized that not everyone understood how to get to the venue and many cab drivers were not aware the event was taking place or where to drop off patrons.
There was also a tweak to the venue clean-up plan from weekend one to two after it became clear workers did not have enough time after the venue shut down to take garbage bags to outside dumpsters and were instead leaving them close to emptied garbage cans, which created a less-than-savory visual.
Because sponsorship has always been a major part of the RIR experience, fans also were treated to plenty of ads and banners from some of the fest’s main supporters, including Mercedes-Benz, iHeartRadio, the Los Angeles Times and Corona beer. (There was even a Mercedes-Benz “Iron Schockl” SUV ride that allowed users to drive up and over a 42-degree incline.)
In postshow meetings, the RIR USA team discussed focusing on communications for the next go, deciding to put more emphasis on reaching potential attendees from California and Arizona, which emerged as the primary markets for the fest.
“We realized midway through the event that we will not give up on this as an international event, but we have to concentrate on those markets,” she said, noting that 15 percent of attendees were locals from Las Vegas and 33 percent were from California. There are also discussions about offering a lower ticket price (GA passes were $300 per weekend and $500 for VIP) for Vegas locals who might have been priced out.
As for what will take place in MGM Resorts Festival Grounds until RIR returns in 2017, Baldizan said MGM is working on that. “We are looking at more events but with our entitlement docs with the county, we had to prove ourselves on this and then go back in front of the county and get a longer-term approval for special events and festivals,” he said. MGM has already announced that the ACM Party For A Cause is slated to take place on the grounds in April 2016 (though that could change depending on permitting.)
He estimated the grounds will eventually host two or three large festivals and perhaps 10-12 smaller shows. It is scalable, Baldizan said. To prepare the land, MGM invested $12 million, Cirque du Soleil, $5 million and Yucaipa, $5 million.
“We’re talking to promoters and different organizations that want to do stuff here every day,” he said.
While Medina declined to discuss ticket gross or concession figures, she said on-the-ground surveys with attendees gave organizers confidence that the next go-round would bring out even bigger crowds and higher returns. “76 percent of people we spoke to in surveys said they want to come back,” she said.
Both Medina and Baldizan said no major upgrades were currently planned for the site, though Medina said new attractions are in the works for 2017 and one small infrastructure upgrade will be deployed before then.
“More than 70 percent of people signed up for Rock Cash from home [before the festival],” she said of the fest’s signature cashless system. Next time she said to expect more on-site locations where you can load up your wristband with festival bucks to ease some of the congestion around the stations in place for the first edition.
Contacted for this story: Roberta Medina, nessaraiva@rockinrio.com; Chris Baldizan (702) 692-6750