Darwin Festival smashes all its own records in most successful season in 39-year history

The 2018 Darwin Festival, which wound up on Sunday after 18 days, smashed all previous attendance and box office figures.

It was the most successful season in its 39-year history.

Over 44,000 tickets were sold, representing 6,800 more than 2017 and 22,567 more than 2016.

It also achieved its highest gross box office since its inception in 1979.

The program featured 703 performers, including 400 NT artists, in 228 free and ticketed performances across 31 Darwin venues.

55% of ticketed shows (93) sold out, with additional theatre, comedy and cabaret shows added on.

Preliminary research data reveals that 32% of visitors originated from outside Darwin, with 25% of visitors from interstate and 7% from overseas.

One in three interstate visitors travelled to Darwin specifically to attend Darwin Festival.

“We are pleased to have the support of local audiences,” said chief executive officer Emily Mann.

“However, growing interstate and international audiences is critical not only to the future success of Darwin Festival, but to the tourism and cultural economies of the Northern Territory under the Turbocharging Tourism stimulus package.

“This year, Darwin Festival implemented a seven-week targeted national digital marketing campaign that has yielded fantastic results.

“In the past month, the digital campaign has been served more than 8.7 million times to online consumers, resulting in over 14,500 click-throughs to the Darwin Festival website that have converted into 258 ticket booking confirmations to consumers in southern states.”

In other achievements:

• All the music shows – including  Baker Boy, Rob Ruha & Ria Hall, Electric Fields, The Teskey Brothers, Gawurra and The Mission Songs Project – hit full capacity.
• The National Indigenous Music Awards hit new crowd levels.
• The first week of ticket sales hit a record 10,160.

“Darwin continues to be enamoured with incredible Spiegeltent shows,” said artistic director Felix Preval.

“The Aurora Spiegeltent, home to the awe-inspiring cabaret show LIMBO, was a smash-hit with 22 performances playing to 11,300 ticket holders.”