Executive Summary
Encounter Festival 2024
2024 saw the rebranding of the festival, along with a concentration of delivery to cover the two full days of Saturday and Sunday, omitting the previous Friday evening delivery.
The aim to commission two new performances was achieved in the production of the Same but Different silent disco and Imitating the dog's Ribble of Dreams installations comprising magical story boxes.
As for each year of the festival, Saturday night's procession formed the centre piece of the two days, followed by the Firework Finale lighting up Preston City Centre.
A further development this year was integrating the centre stage Torchlight Procession with the afternoon's events through providing music and refreshments. This ensured the momentum of the event was continued into the evening and encouraged visitors to stay in the area.
Other performances, workshops and activities over the two days saw locations such as the Flag Market, Guildhall, Fishergate and Winckley Square host 18 different acts over 30 performances.
These extravaganzas included professional acts, community performances and visitor participation, covering such a range as; The Invisible Man, Bollywood Dance, Ribble of Dreams Installations, Encounter Voices and the Silent Disco.
Inclusion
The two thirds of visitors surveyed describing their gender identity as woman, one third as man and 1% as non-binary is reflected in the proportion of visitors stating their sex to be female, male and in another way.
1% of visitors surveyed state their gender is not the same as the sex they were assigned at birth. With 95% of visitors describing their sexual orientation as heterosexual/straight, 5% of visitors described themselves as bisexual, queer, gay man or other.
Around half of visitors surveyed are aged 35-54 years old, with around one quarter aged younger, at 16-34 years old, and around one quarter aged 55 years or older.
Both 2023 and 2024 have seen the inclusion of a higher proportion of visitors aged 35+ years old than in previous years.
Visitors surveyed in 2024 represented 16 of the 17 ethnic identities. This compares to 2023 when visitors surveyed represented 11 of the 17 ethnic identities. 85% of visitors surveyed in 2024 are of a White ethnicity, 6% of an Asian ethnicity, 4% of a Mixed ethnicity, 3% of a Black ethnicity and 1% of an Other ethnicity.
There has been an increase in the proportion of visitors surveyed who are not of a White/White British - White British ethnicity; from 14% in 2023 to 25% in 2024.
2023 experienced an increase in the proportion of visitors surveyed who identify as having a disability. With 10% of visitors in 2024 identifying as having a disability, this remains higher than in 2022. 6% of visitors surveyed in 2024 identify as neurodivergent.
Two thirds of visitors surveyed in 2024 are employed, with around one tenth of visitors each unemployed/not working, retired or in full-time education.
The main type of occupation is of the category modern professional & traditional occupations, accounting for one third of all visitors.
All visitors surveyed in 2024 live in the UK. Just over half of visitors live in Preston (PR1, PR2 or PR3), just over one quarter live in another PR postcode and just under one fifth live in a postcode other than a PR postcode.
There has been a significant increase in 2024 in the proportion of visitors from outside of Preston, increasing from 35% of visitors in 2023 who lived outside of PR1, PR2 or PR3 to 46% of visitors in 2024.
Visitor mix and activity
The increase in the proportion of visitors attending with someone else, which had been experienced in 2023 when this had reverted back to the height of 2018, has not be maintained in 2024.
The 71% of visitors surveyed in 2024 attending with someone else has reverted to the levels experienced in 2021 and 2022.
Just over half of accompanying visitors (51%) were aged 16+ years old, 32% were aged 5-11 years old, 12% aged 0-4 years old and 4% were aged 12-15 years old.
The average size of visitor groups (including the respondent) was 2.8 per visitor group.
For nearly one fifth of visitors surveyed in 2024, Encounter Festival was their first participation in an arts and culture experience. For around three fifths of visitors, they attend or participate in at least two arts and cultures experiences a year.
With just over two fifths of visitors having attended this/an NTO event previously, nearly three fifths of visitors surveyed in 2024 had not attended this/an NTO event previously.
Working with Encounter Festival
Performances at Encounter Festival
The feedback from performers working with Encounter Festival is highly positive and enthusiastic.
Providing the acts with opportunities for developing their work and skills, showcasing their abilities, promoting their skills and contribution to the community, representing their cultural background, working with new audiences, taking the arts to people who might not otherwise have access and performing in a new location are all factors encouraging the acts to take part.
The significant scale and scope of Encounter Festival further encourages involvement with the event.
Amazing that a festival of that scale is in Preston; to be part of that was an amazing opportunity
One of the greatest things about performing our work outdoors is how accessible it is to audiences. They're able to watch performances without having to buy a ticket.
The artists were effectively supported throughout the process by Encounter Festival.
Provision of timely and relevant information, flexibility, an open approach and freedom in the development of the performances all contributed to the smooth running of the process.
It was what the young people wanted to do (a silent disco), they had complete freedom, and it was brilliant that Esther really opened it up and let them decide what they wanted to organise & produce.
The whole Encounter team was really supportive and organised throughout.
The process, communication and support provided by Encounter Festival contributed to the successful delivery of the performances.
It was noted that 2024 was in some way special - that all elements had positively integrated - that it had a silver lining. Encounter Festival contributed positively to the performances.
Just really supportive, provided everything we needed...They liaised with us about what we needed to deliver. It was a really good process.
This time Encounter Festival had a silver lining. The laser lights outside The Harris were beautiful, the build up to the event the day before and the day after were quite interesting.
Contribution
Encounter Festival provided the opportunity for the performances to contribute. Showcasing the positivity and skills of young disabled people, promoting opportunities for inclusion, engaging with the community, providing quality performances, bringing new experiences and inspiration to people and performing to people who might not otherwise experience the arts; as well as providing enjoyable, engaging and fun performances for visitors to enjoy and join in with.
Mela brings a rich, diverse aspect of Preston to Encounter, it also brings very high quality talented performers who exist in Preston to highlight their existence... and also to showcase how entertaining and how enriching these artforms can be...
I hope it inspired people to start dancing or attend dance performances in the future.
Just something that was youth lead and what I really loved to see being there on the day was the range of ages that came and took part in the silent disco and just the joy that everyone seemed to be experiencing, it was lovely to see.
On a practical level, the skills and self-confidence of the young people in Blaze had been developed through their involvement with the festival's production.
Confidence and increasing their sense of value...You could really see a change in their confidence, it gave them something to build on, a real confidence boost.
Going forwards with Encounter
All three performances are keen to be a part of Encounter Festival 2025.
The event provides a significant platform from which to perform, showcase and engage. Participation also provides the opportunity to benefit from longer term relationships and to develop the performance within the event. Precise involvement can depend on funding availability.
We would love to do that, that is one thing that is always there in our annual agenda, we always discuss Encounter, to be able to participate with Encounter.
Definitely, it would be brilliant. I always think longer term partnerships are much better and it gives us that chance to build on it and improve, once we've done it once.
Encounter Festival is a great platform, it's a fantastic festival in Lancashire and we would love to return in the future. We have a wide repertoire of shows and it's always great to revisit festivals and engage with their audiences over the years.
Encounter going forwards
There were no significant ways in which Encounter Festival could work better. One act needed a great deal of flexibility, which Encounter Festival had worked to provide, the route for the procession could be slightly more practical for the use of props, and widening its geography are the suggestions made.
It is felt that Encounter Festival has significant potential to engage further with the community and young people; to provide and support a unique range of experiences, skills and development.
There is the potential for Encounter Festival to extend its community reach and integration.
Visiting local community performances and activities over the year could provide the opportunity to raise awareness, engage with new community groups, promote ways in which they can be involved with the festival and initiate processes to develop this involvement.
Early involvement and communication with a range of community groups would support such integration.
We have a lot of small communities which exist in Preston. I think a quick meeting with them well before the event to involve and include Encounter Festival in their agendas as well and to spread the word among their groups.
Motionhouse dancers have also delivered inspiring Curtain Raiser projects with young people at festivals in the past, which have proved to be a fantastic way of further engaging the community.
There is the potential for Encounter Festival to support young people who are interested in the arts as a career.
A traineeship, internship, work experience, talking at colleges and universities and holding day sessions where young people can experience the production activity behind the scenes can all contribute to this; with such knowledge and experience providing young people with information and practical experience.
This could also support young people from backgrounds which historically have been excluded from the arts or who face barriers to getting involved.
Encounter Festival has the potential to be a significant learning resource and stepping stone for young people.
From our point of view it's how cultural events provide an opportunity for young people to pursue pathways into the industry, not just disabled young people, it's a very difficult sector for young people to get into.
It's an amazing opportunity in Preston and it would be a shame if more young people in Preston couldn't learn from it and use it as a stepping stone.
Marketing
Meeting Preston City Council's aim of encouraging inclusion and community involvement with arts events, Encounter Festival is one of their arts festivals. Preston City Council provide the marketing support for the event.
Year round marketing activity is undertaken using social media and the website to generate engagement, build brand awareness and promote the date of the festival; aiming to generate and maintain awareness over the year.
Further work is undertaken in designing the programme and supporting billboards and banners to make the festival known in the City. The rebranding of Encounter Festival was also undertaken in 2024.
The development of the event's footfall and geographical reach is approached through using Preston's transport links, with the aim to extend the reach of the festival.
The event's evaluation strongly informs the following year's marketing activities; with this insight influencing the direction and focus of the marketing activity to support the growth strategy and identify where to best apply resource and budget.
Illustrating the level of pre-event marketing and communication is that just under three quarters of visitors had seen or heard about Encounter Festival prior to the event.
Facebook is the one main source of awareness prior to the event, identified as a source of awareness by virtually half of visitors who had seen or heard about Encounter.
Word of mouth is the only other form of communication mentioned to any significant extent, highlighting the importance of these two forms of communication.
The total reach achieved for Encounter Festival in 2024 was 1.29 million, with the Central Radio Campaign generating four fifths of this reach.
Further supporting the effectiveness of Facebook, is that the Facebook posts generated significantly the highest reach and engagement of all the other forms of online and website activity.