From passive behavior to creative inclusion PIP CLOO An explorative study on From passiveaudience involvement behavior in the organization of festivals in The Netherlands to creative inclusion University of Amsterdam Master’s Thesis Business Administration Entrepreneurship & Innovation Statement of originality This document is written by Pip Cloo who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document. Author: Pip Cloo (10083863) I declare that the text and the work presented in this document Supervisor: dhr. drs. A.C.C. Gruijters is original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it. Second Supervisor: dhr. dr. W. van der Aa The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents. Date: June 29, 2015 ABSTRACT There is a high amount of competition in the festival market these days and festivals are trying to come up with unique, new concepts in order to compete. However, inventing something truly new has become more difficult (Schiermer, 2014; Gursoy et al., 2009). Co-innovation seems to be the solution for this problem as it is difficult to imitate because of the experience, co-creation and engagement which form its core (Lee et al., 2012). Burning Man is a festival organized in America which is completely based on co-creation and could offer as an example for the Dutch festival market. This research has been conducted with the goal to formulate recommendations for Dutch festival organizations regarding the use of co-creation. From the literature review it became clear empirical research was necessary as many concepts and processes were found with a complex cohesion and relationship. It was not clear which concepts would become important for the purpose of this research. With the help of empirical research which made use of in-depth interviews it was possible to get insight into how customer involvement plays as role in the festival market in The Netherlands by interviewing ten festival visitors and two organizers on their thoughts and behavior. Sub-questions were formulated which offered the ability to get more insights into the current situation and to be able to formulate an advice for the festival organizations. The results show co- creation is used by visitors as a means for self-expression. The value creation for co-creation festivals is based on emotional experiences and emotional involvement, which makes the character different from ‘normal’ festivals. Freedom is closely related to co-creation and variation is important as it allows for personalization. Customer involvement results in a richer experience which stimulates the creation of unique value where visitors are willing to invest time, energy and effort in. The sense of community is a binding factor and people prefer uniformity over individuality. Based on the results it is recommended for festival organizations to only implement co-creation partly into their set-up in order to answer individual needs and to be unique, but to remain profitable at the same time. Variation is important and there should be a focus on experiences. The visitors should be stimulated to participate by showing them the unique and personal value. However, because co-creation only appeals to a niche and adaptation to the experience takes time it is advised to communicate co- creation in the right way to the audience. The character of a festival should be focused towards freedom in behavior and being. An open culture will stimulate participation and own initiative. Furthermore, it is recommended to create a culture at a festival which makes people feel they are part of a group and to connect them to the festival and others visitors. This will lead to emotional involvement, value creation and more loyalty to the festival. Keywords: co-creation, festivals, experiences, sense of community 0 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION 3 1.1 The Burning Man concept 4 1.2 Research objective 5 2. LITERATURE REVIEW 6 2.1 Innovation 7 2.2 Co-innovation 7 2.3 Co-creation 8 2.4 Prosumption 9 2.5 Motivation to visit festivals 10 2.6 Self-expression 11 2.7 Value creation 12 2.8 Conclusion 13 3. RESEARCH QUESTION AND RESEARCH PROCESS 15 3.1 Research questions 15 3.2 Research strategy 16 3.3 Data collection 17 3.3.1 Interview guide 18 3.3.2 Sample 19 3.4 First phase of data analysis 20 3.4.1 Main themes and concepts 21 3.4.2 Additional literature and changes 21 3.5 Conclusion 22 4. RESULTS 4.1 Co-creation 24 4.1.1 Variation 25 4.1.2 Contribution 25 4.1.3 Participation 26 4.2 Festival Character 27 4.2.1 Value features and brand features 28 4.2.2 Positive attributes 28 4.2.3 Experience resulting from the festival character 29 4.3 Emotional Experience 30 4.3.1 Freedom 31 4.3.2 Adaptation 31 4.3.3 Personal change 32 4.4 Sense of Community 32 4.4.1 Identification 33 4.4.2 Community feeling 33 4.4.3 Inclusion 35 4.5 Conclusion 35 5. DISCUSSION 36 5.1 How co-creation is used 36 5.2 How experiences are involved with the festival character 38 5.3 How emotional experiences are involved with festivals 40 5.4 The role of the social image 41 5.5 Conclusion 43 1 6. RECOMMENDATIONS 45 6.1 The implementation of co-creation 45 6.2 Character of freedom 46 6.3 Stimulating the visitors 47 6.4 Connection to the festival and other visitors 47 6.5 Future research and limitations 48 7. CONCLUSION 49 8. REFERENCE LIST 50 APPENDIX 1: The Ten Principles of Burning Man 54 APPENDIX 2: Interview guide festival visitors 56 APPENDIX 3: Interview guide festival organizations 59 APPENDIX 4: Overview candidates interviews 62 APPENDIX 5: Coding scheme 63 APPENDIX 6: Memos and coding examples 65 APPENDIX 7: Value features and brand features 67 APPENDIX 8: Interview transcript Martijn 69 2 1. INTRODUCTION Festivals are an important aspect of the Dutch culture in summer. Many youngsters seem to spend their leisure time in this period by visiting at least one of the many music events that are taking place. This trend has resulted into strong competition in the Dutch festival market. It often seems to visitors as if there are already too many music festivals to choose from. However, more and more events are organized each year. Large festival organizations such as Lowlands, Pinkpop, and ID&T seem to have more problems with selling tickets for their festivals as a result of the rising competition (Leenders, Telgen, Gemser & Van der Wurff, 2005). If many events are organized, the demand for these happenings will decrease and in turn may lead to high price competition as observed in other media industries. A study by Van der Wurff and Cuilenburg (2001) has indeed shown that this type of competition has led to similarity instead of diversification in the television branch. These results could be extrapolated to the music festival industry as well. Festivals thus have to use a differentiation strategy to avoid a price war. They need to stay innovative and distinguish themselves in order to be different from each other. (Van der Wurff & Cuilenburg, 2001; Larson, 2009). Innovation has shown to be a key factor in the market in order to be competitive and succeed in the market (Lee, Olson & Trimi, 2012). Research has proven that uniqueness is one of the aspects that is important for the attendance rate of visitors and thus cannot be ignored (Gursoy et al., 2009). Festival organizations are trying to come up with new, unique concepts that are eventually copied by others (Schiermer, 2014). It turns out that in this highly competitive and dynamic market, inventing something that is truly new has become increasingly difficult. One form of innovation that is rising in popularity is co-innovation, in which experience, co- creation, and engagement form the core. It helps to establish competitive advantage as it is difficult to imitate by competitors. (Lee et al., 2012). This type of innovation seems to be important for festivals, looking at the competition and the demand of the visitors who are constantly looking for new experiences (Larson, 2009). A festival which is already making use of co-creation successfully is Burning Man. This festival exists since 1986 and has been growing in popularity over the past twenty years. It is unique in its character as it is created along the lines of self-expression and co-creation (Gomez, 2013). The festival is not only present in America, but is also stimulating other organizations worldwide to create local Burning Man events, known as ‘regionals’. (Chen, 2012) The most well known regional Burning Man event is AfrikaBurn. Other examples include ‘Midburn’ in Israel, ‘Burning Japan’, and ‘Burners from Belgium’. The Burning Man festival concept seems to be spreading around the world rapidly, as many people are interested in its philosophy. It might set foot in the festival market in The Netherlands as well, which is why it serves as an example for this research wherein there will be looked at the implementation of co-creation into this market. 3 1.1 The Burning Man concept Burning Man takes place every year in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada in The United States of America together with over 50.000 participants from around the world. People need to be selected to be able to participate in this festival and tickets can only be bought at a maximum of two per person which stimulates the authenticity and uniqueness of the event.