Pod Festivals Ltd, the entity behind the renowned Forbidden Fruit and All Together Now music festivals, announced a significant increase in profits of €1.55 million following taxes in 2022, substantially higher than the €272,977 seen in the previous year, revealed in recently submitted accounts. The Dublin-based company has already confirmed line-ups for this year’s All Together Now festival, to be held on the August bank holiday at Curraghmore Estate, Co Waterford, with noteworthy acts such as The National, Roisin Murphy, and Future Islands. Meanwhile, Forbidden Fruit, set in the grounds of the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham in Dublin on the June bank holiday, will see performances by Nelly Furtado and Groove Armada. The 2022 profits were bolstered by fully writing off €384,260 owed to the late founding director, John Reynolds. In 2022 and 2021, Pod Festivals Ltd was allocated €544,292 under the Covid-19 associated Live Performance Support Grant scheme run by the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media. €100,000 of this was received in 2022 and incurred towards expenses of organising and staging the Forbidden Fruit Festival. The company benefited from a further €444,292 under the same scheme in 2021, which supported the expenditure of the Meadows Festival 2021. Additionally, an insurance claim of €348,000 was made in 2020 following the cancellation of live events due to the pandemic. The company has also received wage subsidy schemes totalling €18,964 in 2022 and €77,140 in 2021. The company’s after-tax profit of €1.55m in 2022 has significantly reduced its net losses from €3.75m to €2.19m, although cash funds have decreased from €630,313 to €172,755.
A message included in the financial statements, endorsed by the board members, James Reynolds and Michael Gallagher, on the 15th of March, 2024, indicates that there is an outstanding working capital loan of €2.3 million that the company is due to settle. Currently, dialogue is underway with the lending institution concerning an extension of the loan’s repayment period.
The message reveals the receipt of a letter from the lender, expressing their intention to be lenient towards the loan. This leniency is contingent upon agreement of terms and evidences the lender’s openness towards postponing the payment deadlines correlated with these amounts.