Fans of Rocking the Daisies, and especially those who have already bought tickets, have been left fuming by the festival’s late changes to their alcohol and drinks policy.

The changes were announced on Friday, and if you were planning on filling that two-litre bottle with your rocket fuel before heading to the stage, then it’s bad news.

Or, you know, if you were planning on taking water because you had other party tricks in mind.

Essentially, as per the announcement on Facebook, “you will not be allowed to bring alcohol or any liquids into Rocking the Daisies 2018…Enjoy your favourite drinks cold, poured and prepared for you just the way you like it.”

That means buy it from the bar, and that meant plenty of angry ticket holders raging on social media.

I will spare you those screenshots and skip ahead to the apology, issued yesterday, again via the Daisies Facebook page.

Here are some excerpts from that:

Firstly we would like to apologise to everyone for the frustration caused, especially announcing such a big change a month before the festival.

We would like to start by debunking a myth doing the rounds that this is our first year in the festival. It’s important to note that new management has been involved since 2016 and this is in fact our third run at this.

2018 CHANGES
This is not the first big change to Rocking the Daisies 2018, many people have seen our changes, including the splitting of camp sites – we were proactive in implementing new systems, creating a safer environment rather than reacting to an influx of crime-related activities that have plagued other festivals around the country.

A little dig there at OppiKoppi, in case you were wondering.

NEW ALCOHOL POLICY
Looking to cut out all decanted plastic bottles/cups we wanted an easy solution for people not having to carry their booze into the festival. We solved this by selling products as close to our cost price as possible: you will see a 440 ml beer can cost anywhere around R12-R14 a beer at a liquor store and we are selling it on to the festival goer at R15 – some products are even being sold at cost price…

We will undoubtedly be making a loss on our bars this year as we have removed the industry standard 200-300% mark-up and replaced it with anything from 0% to 20%. It is impossible to recover the costs of infrastructure, staff and logistics attached to all of these drinks on site, especially with the festival being an hour out of Cape Town. This is not a move made out of greed, if it was, it would be a highly unsuccessful way of doing it.

If you will no longer be attending the event you will need to put your tickets up for sale on ticketpony.co.za…

That bit has really pissed people off, who feel like the festival should refund them for changing the drinks policy at such a late stage.

One tweet that is doing the rounds comes via @Sa_Dee27:

There’s an image of an exchange with a ticketing company which we have cropped out. We are unsure as to whether or not others have managed to land a refund via this route.

Back to the apology:

WATER AT THE FESTIVAL
South Africa currently has no solution for water outside of plastic bottles or glass (still and sparkling), we have been working extremely hard on this and have a solution lined up that will create a new reality for South African festivals that can be picked up and used by the rest of the industry going forward – getting rid of the single use plastic bottle for good.

This will have an unmeasurably positive impact on our environment. IT’S IMPORTANT TO NOTE: there are water points providing free water across the whole festival.

Any attempt to reduce plastic waste should be applauded. I guess, but people doubt their motives.

THE PLASTIC CUP ISSUE
Our final hurdle was plastic cups, with the help of our headline sponsor we believe we might have found the answer to a global problem on plastic cups, an indefinite solution that will change the way festivals and events around the world serve drinks. More info on this coming very soon!

As much as it might hurt at first, talking about environmental change and actually actively implementing changes are two different things. We have chosen to back our words up with action, no matter the growing pains that come with it.

This solution will keep our roads safe, make our festival truly green and our festival goers safer than ever.

Change is never easy although it is necessary for growth.

Some of the top-ranked comments on that apology show how angry people remain:

• So from the posts I’ve seen our consumer rights have been breached by releasing this information after the point of sale and quite obviously Daisies do not care because nothing has changed. Their pathetic statement release shows that they think we are idiots and that they can do as they please. Quite obviously legal action is needed… any budding (or qualified lawyers) on here willing to represent the masses and work with a consumer rights group or similar to fight our case for refunds please? In fact if someone could do this I would happily give them a personal donation (I’m sure many others would too) because at this stage it’s not even about the refund it’s about justice – they cannot get away with this . #oopsiedaisies

This one goes for the jugular:

• Change is necessary for growth ?  my guy, ain’t nobody going next year. You should change your name to “Rocking your wallets”

Number-crunching time:

• 10 rand a vodka shot x 30 shots per bottle= 300 rand… if I can get Smirnoff for 100 rand, you definetly [sic] get it cheaper in bulk or even cheaper vodka… let’s say it stays at 100 per bottle, that is a 300% markup on something that will be heavily drunk at the festival… dont pretend you’re the victim… you’re still taking advantage…

Enjoy the hangover, but we get your point.

Stay hydrated!

• Sooo with regards to the free water at the “water points”, are we supposed to carry the water in our hands or just take a really big sip and keep it in our cheeks slowly swallowing it bit by bit and the night goes on?(Are we allowed to bring empty bottles to store the water you give us?)

Maybe the social media managers of Spree and Daisies can get together and share war stories.

What do people in South Africa do when they get angry, other than vent on Facebook? Well, protesting is out of the question (can you imagine all the awkward shuffling and bungling of protest songs?), so it’s online petition time.

This one, over on Avaaz, has almost reached its goal at the time of writing:

Ja, boet, if you love something, you gotta faaaaiggght for it, hey.

I enjoyed this quip:

Before you ask – yes, that is the guy from South Africa’s most infamous Come Dine With Me episode.

Every year of Rocking the Daisies comes with controversy (wait until the uproar over which university students get to miss which tests), and 2018 appears to be no different.

[source:facebook&avaaz]