Tomorrowland has requested permission to run its Belgium festival across three weekends in 2022.
The proposal has been put forward to the governing bodies of Boom, which is the town where the event is usually held.
Debby Wilmsen is a spokesperson for Tomorrowland, and she told Belgian news outlet Het Laatste Nieuws that the three-weekend plan is a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, saying that the festival organisers “really have to do this to cushion the financial hangover” of the last two years. She also added that “before COVID, there were no plans to start organising three weekends.”
Apparently, the festival has made substantial financial losses of around €25 million due to cancelling all their in-person events in both 2020 and 2021 due the COVID-19 restrictions. So, they say the three-weekend plans are an “economic necessity to compensate for the cancellations.”
Since 2017, Tomorrowland’s main summer event has been held across two weekends, as increased demand has meant a lot of people were unable to get tickets otherwise, so a second date had been introduced.
It’s currently unknown if local government officials plan to approve Tomorrowland’s proposal, but the previous years cancellation has caused financial worries for not only the organisers, but also for suppliers, freelancers and other kinds of employees who make a large amount of annual income from supporting the event.
In the event’s official statement, Debby Wilmsen also said: “Do not forget that we have already had to miss six festival weekends, four in Belgium and another two in France with Tomorrowland Winter,” then continued. “We also owe it to our festival-goers; we get an enormous amount of questions about tickets and the waiting lists keep growing.” She also makes is very clear that if approved: “Our request really is one-off”, so it will go back to being two weeks from 2023 onwards.
Tomorrowland 2022 is already confirmed to take place in Belgium across the weekends of 22nd-24th July and 29th-31st July, the potential third weekend is planned for 15th-17th July. Tomorrowland will also return to the French Alps in 2022 from 19th-16th March with Armin van Buuren, Paul Kalkbrenner and Afrojack already confirmed to play.
H/T: DJ Mag
