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3 months later, Electric Zoo ticket holders still wait for refunds
By
Jon Campbell
Published Nov 30, 2023
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By
Jon Campbell
Published Nov 30, 2023
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Tens of thousands of people who bought tickets to the ill-fated Electric Zoo festival are still waiting for refunds, nearly three months after the annual electronic dance music gathering on Randall’s Island descended into chaos.
So far, Electric Zoo hasn’t issued direct refunds to those who attended the festival over Labor Day weekend, though some have successfully disputed the charges for tickets with their credit card companies.
The first day of this year’s festival was abruptly canceled just hours before gates were to open, with the city declining to issue permits as the organizers struggled to get the stages built on time, and thousands of people were blocked from attending the third day after organizers oversold tickets and festival grounds quickly reached capacity.
Electric Zoo’s organizers — led by Avant Gardner, the company that also owns the Brooklyn Mirage, an East Williamsburg megavenue — haven’t communicated with ticket holders since Sept. 13, when they sent an email asking for “patience” and pledging to “be in touch with the specifics [about refunds] as soon as possible.”
Since then, hundreds of festivalgoers have taken to Reddit, Facebook and other social media platforms to voice their frustration and document their efforts to dispute their ticket charges, with some banks refunding the money to their accounts and others declining to do so.
“I think the whole situation is pretty frustrating,” said Victor Rivera, 21, a resident of Mercer County, New Jersey, who attended the festival and helps run an EDM news site, Raverade. “Why release a wordy statement to just end up saying, like, nothing at the end of it, and then only to sit silent for like two months?”
Rivera said his chargeback request with his bank remains pending.
In response to questions from Gothamist, Avant Gardner issued a brief statement on Wednesday afternoon, in which it again promised refunds without providing further detail.
"Electric Zoo will be issuing refunds to impacted ticket buyers and details will be communicated to them directly,” the statement reads.
Since its inception in 2009, Electric Zoo has drawn some of the biggest electronic music acts in the world to Randall’s Island every Labor Day weekend, luring tens of thousands of attendees each year.
This year’s event — the first to be run entirely by Avant Gardner after it purchased the festival’s parent company, Made Event LLC, last year — had a capacity of 42,500 attendees each day, according to the NYPD. General admission ticket holders paid anywhere from $179 to $329 for a three-day pass, not including fees, while platinum VIP ticket holders paid upwards of $1,000.
But the entire festival was marred by problems, with the first day’s cancellation coming less than three hours before gates were supposed to open. At the time, Electric Zoo organizers blamed it on supply chain issues; city officials later made clear they declined to issue the proper permits.
The second day of the festival was delayed by two hours. And on the third and final day, the NYPD estimated festival organizers oversold its capacity by more than 7,000 tickets — prompting authorities to shut down admission gates, which led to people crashing the entrance and entering without security screenings or having their tickets scanned.
At the time, New York City Mayor Eric Adams pledged to take action against Electric Zoo’s organizers within a matter of days. It was a significant pledge, considering Adams and his administration have close ties to Avant Gardner and tried to intervene when the company’s Brooklyn venue was battling with the State Liquor Authority last year.
But so far, no action has been taken.
Last week, a City Hall spokesperson said the matter has been referred to the city’s Law Department.
Nick Paolucci, a spokesperson for the Law Department, declined further comment.
Since this year’s festival, Avant Gardner and its connected companies and investors — including co-owner Jurgen “Billy” Bildstein — have been hit with four separate class-action lawsuits, all alleging varying degrees of fraud and seeking millions of dollars in damages connected to the festival.
Lee Squitieri, a New York-based attorney representing one of the groups of plaintiffs, said his clients keep asking him: “When are we going to get our refunds?”
Squitieri acknowledged there are some complications for Avant Gardner to consider, most notably how to determine who gets a refund and who doesn’t, particularly when some entered the festival on Sunday without having their ticket scanned. But he said there’s a simple solution: Give everyone a refund, since all three days of the festival were marred by one problem or another.
“The Friday show didn't happen,” he said. “The Saturday show was abbreviated. The full schedule of the shows didn’t go on. Even the people who were admitted were subject to lengthy delays in line. They missed good parts of the shows. Sunday was more of the same, except it was worse.”
If and when Electric Zoo issues refunds, Squitieri said it still wouldn’t mean an end to the lawsuits. He said it will be up to a judge to decide whether the festival organizers should pick up the tab for other costs — things like hotel stays and airfare and other travel expenses.
“That’s going to shake out in the class action,” he said. “That will be a matter for the judge to decide what the commonality is beyond ticket refund.”
Whether the festival continues in future years remains to be seen.
In prior years, the festival’s previous organizers, Made Event LLC, held an annual Black Friday sale with tickets for the coming year’s Electric Zoo. This year, there was no such sale.
Jon Campbell
Jon Campbell covers the New York State Capitol for WNYC and Gothamist. Prior to that, he covered the Capitol for more than a decade for the USA TODAY Network. He has twice earned the Walter T. Brown Memorial Award, an honor given annually by the Legislative Correspondents Association alumni for outstanding state government coverage. Jon grew up in the Buffalo area and graduated from the University at Albany. Got a tip? Email Jon at [email protected] or Signal at JonCampbellNY.90.
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