Chicago’s neighborhood street festivals — a staple of summertime in the city — are struggling to survive, according to a new coalition of 20 festival organizers that includes Chicago’s Pride Fest, Taste of Randolph and the Square Roots Fest in Lincoln Square.
The organizers have joined forces to sound the alarm on rising operating costs and diminishing entry donations. Those two factors, the group said, have made the model unsustainable.
The coalition called “Save Our Street Fests,” which went public with its concerns Friday, also includes nonprofit street festivals such as Wicker Park Fest, Northalsted Market Days, Lincoln Square Ravenswood Apple Fest and several others.
The group said that the cost of producing a street festival in Chicago has “skyrocketed,” from fees for security, entertainment, staffing and insurance to expenses for portable restrooms. At the same time, donations from the public at festival gates have dropped dramatically.
Pamela Maass, executive director of the Wicker Park Bucktown Chamber of Commerce, said there’s often confusion about how the events are funded and why street festivals ask for a donation at the entrance, while downtown city-run events, like Blues Fest, do not.
The festivals, which are free to attend and ask for donations at the gate, are put on by neighborhood nonprofits, like the chamber. Maass said the events don’t receive any city funding, but since they take place on public streets, they aren’t allowed to require attendees to buy a ticket. At this time, Maass said the coalition isn’t pushing for that to change — they just want people to know that if they don’t pay up, these events could vanish.
“As far as moving toward requiring ticketed entry, that’s not what our intention is right now,” Maass said. “Our intention is simply just to raise awareness that if you are thinking, ‘maybe I shouldn’t donate,’ then maybe you should also be thinking, ‘maybe this fest won’t be here next year,’ because that is the situation that we are about to be facing.”
Maass points to the beloved Silver Room Block Party — which called it quits in 2023 after 21 years — as a cautionary tale. Organizer Eric Williams told WBEZ at the time that his decision to cease production of the event was, in part, due to mounting costs for security, permits and insurance and artists fees.
Escalating costs, including soaring fees to book musicians, were also cited as a factor that put pressure on the indie music festival Pitchfork, according to co-founder Mike Reed. The festival announced its exit from Chicago last fall after 19 years.
“People say, ‘Man, it used to be free.’ I’m like, ‘It was never free for me. It was free for you.’ We had sponsors here and there and some vendor fees, but you pretty much had one guy paying for a party for 20 to 30,000 people,” Williams, the Silver Room organizer, told WBEZ in 2023. “That’s not sustainable. I spent so much energy explaining to people about the cost of generators, the cost of security, the cost of performances, the cost of permits and insurance. The average person has no idea how expensive it is.”
Now, the new coalition — an effort being led by the Wicker Park Bucktown Chamber — said it is a “critical” moment for neighborhood street festivals overall.
Maass said Wicker Park Fest — known for its indie music lineup — has been forced to scale back this year’s footprint. In a cost-saving effort, the festival will remove a stage and have fewer performers, after last year’s festival reported record-breaking attendance, but the lowest level of gate donations in the event’s 20-year history.
A downturn in festivals could have trickle-down consequences for local businesses, which the coalition said benefit from the foot traffic the events draw.
Right now, the coalition is focused on urging Chicagoans to pay up before entering a neighborhood street festival.
“Please, please, please, be generous at the gates this summer,” Maass said. “Keep our communities thriving. We don’t want to turn into an Amazon box. We want to make sure that we have real brick-and-mortars to go out and shop at and drink it and eat it, and making sure that our neighborhoods are just as vibrant as ever.”