Top comedy festival cancelled due to recession (From Your Local Guardian)

Top Wimbledon comedy festival in Cannizaro Park cancelled due to recession

3:50pm Monday 16th March 2009 in Business News By Ben Thompson

Organisers have canned this year’s Cannizaro Park Festival as the recession continues to hit Wimbledon.

The three-week comedy and music extravaganza that has attracted entertainers from Jimmy Carr to Jason Donovan over the last two decades will not go ahead this summer as funding for the event dries up.

Sponsorship had been vital for the festival’s survival but the decision to cancel was announced today after it emerged that Wimbledon businesses were pulling their support.

Peter Beckwith, Chairman of Cannizaro Event Ltd said: “The problem of raising the money for the festival this year has been two-fold: the current recession and the lack of confidence in the level of attendance from local audiences.

“Last year the festival was bigger and better than ever but last year also saw the largest loss for us.

“We hope that the positive outcome from this reluctant decision to cancel this year will be a rallying of local people to ensure the festival’s continuance by buying tickets for Cannizaro 2010 – the new goal that we are working towards.”

A spokesman from the New Wimbledon Theatre, which had been contracted to run the festival, added that the economic downturn had prevented several philanthropic local businessmen from supporting this year’s event.

Chief Executive of the Merton Chamber of Commerce, Diana Sterck, attributed the lack of funding to businesses tightening their belts by reducing sponsorship budgets.

“Obviously this is disappointing and hopefully it will just be a one-year blip. Merton needs Cannizaro to stay on the map but clearly this is just a sign of the times.”

Richard Hunter, Chairman of the Wimbledon Village Business Association, led concerns that the local economy would suffer from the cancellation.

He said: “The festival has always created a great atmosphere drawing people in and there’s no doubt that we’re going to miss out from that, but I completely understand why businesses have reduced their support during what is such a tough time.”