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Smithfield VA Bacon & Bourbon Fest
Updates for Cancellation for Oct 1, 2022 See below for most recent update, or to view previous updates scroll down this page.
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For additional FAQ's, please see info boxes for more detailed info.
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NEW UPDATE: 12/7/2022:
Good News, we have a "draft settlement statement" from the insurance company and have started the process of issuing refunds. We started this a few days ago, so some of you have received them. See below for some refund info based on what type of ticket you had. **NEW DATE FOR NEXT YEAR** So twice now, we have had to cancel this event due to hurricanes so we are MOVING it to NOV starting in 2023 to try and get us out the prime-time of hurricane season. So moving it from the first Saturday in Oct to the SECOND SATURDAY OF NOVEMBER. So, next year the date is: November 11, 2023! FOR ON-LINE PURCHASES: You should receive a refund notification email from PayPal to the email address you used when you purchased your tickets. If you don't see it, you might need to check your spam folder. The credit will show up either on your credit card statement or in your paypal account depending on how you paid for it. This can take a few days from the time the refund was processed so if you don't see it on your statement right away, give it a few days and check again. Completed - Early Bird Tickets: Either individual or those purchased with the Season Bundle are completed. (If you had a combo of Early Bird and General Admit, you might not be processed yet.) In-Progress - General Admit Tix & Non-Sponsor Tables: We are working on these now but they are time-consuming and there are a lot of you. We hope to be complete with all of them by Dec 14th. Chalets, Sponsor Tables, Small Biz & and anyone else who paid via a invoice and not on-line via add to cart on-line on our website: We can do some now, and are starting with those of you that are also involved in BOB Fest. It's a little complicated how the reimbursements from the insurance work, but we will get claim funds from them in "phases". Our fest director will work with you individually on your status. But, no worries, everyone will get refunded! If you have any questions please contact us at [email protected]. |
REFUND FAQ's...
Why can't you just Do refunds now?
Tens of thousands of dollars are spent months in advance to hold festivals. That combined with the loss of day of revenues that did not get to happen, means that we can't give full refunds until we get the insurance check. That can take weeks to months... This is also the problem when we have to cancel and it is not covered by insurance. That is why our Refund, Cancellation & Rules Policy is made available to you before you purchase tickets to our charitable festival or participate in a sponsorship. We can't always give a full refund and provide you this information before you buy tickets. It also explains about how it works when we do file a claim and that we have to wait on the insurance check. For this festival, the cancellation was for a castraphoic weather situation, so it is something that is covered by our cancellation insurance. What kind of things does an event spend money on before the day of a festival?
Lots of things! Tickets were printed and postage paid for, advertising, ordering all supplies like tasting glasses, stadium cups, food for the bacon condiment bar and signage are all ordered and secured well in advance of fest day. Deposits to rental companies for tents & restrooms had been paid. The closer to an event that it is canceled, the more the expenses are that cannot be mitigated. For example, all the tents were up by Wed at noon so the tent company is paid. They start so early in the week because after they get it all up, we still have at least two days worth of work to do to get the site ready for our guests. the weather was not so bad on saturday. Why did you cancel SO early?
Yeah...Saturday wasn't so bad. However, starting on Fri morning there were 25-35 mph sustained winds and gusts up to 55-60 mph and almost 3" of rain. Leaving the tents up under those conditions endangers public safety, so they had to come down before the storm got here. If they had remained up, they would have become projectile hazards. It remained bad until about 2:30 am on Saturday Oct 1st. There was not time to reset the site between 2:30 am and the fest starting at 11 am. It takes all week to set up an event of this scale. Once the tent company gets everything in place, it still takes us two days to and lots of volunteers to get everything else ready for our guests. why can't you just move it to another date this fall?
Short answer - with all of the planning it takes to produce one of our festivals, it just isn't financially or logistically possible to have a rain date. Most rental equipment (tents, generators and restrooms) require deposits and have to be secured usually 6-12 months in advance. Bands have to be booked and often required deposits to hold a date as well. We also use about 400 volunteers for this event, so asking them all to schedule a back-up date isn't very reasonable. The site is also rented for other types of events and functions so it is not always available. HOW CAN I STAY UPDATED ON WHEN REFUNDS WILL HAPPEN AND WHO DO I CONTACT IF I STILL HAVE QUESTIONS?
Updates will be posted here on this page as we continue to navigate the insurance process. So check here first. If you have other specific questions, please send us an email at: [email protected] PAST UPDATES:
9/29/22 - OrIginal cancellation statement:
**UPDATE** - posted 9/29/22 Smithfield VA Events regrets to announce that due to the projections regarding the remnants of Hurricane Ian, the annual Bacon & Bourbon Music Fest scheduled for Saturday, October 1st, 2022 is cancelled. With the anticipated storm arrival on Friday, and out of concern for the safety of our volunteers, attendees and vendors, the Town of Smithfield has closed the venue site and requested that we mitigate the potential for projectile hazards by clearing the site of tents. This combined with the reallocation of the Town’s Emergency Services to manage the impacts of this type of storm and to support the Governor’s State of Emergency that has been issued prevents us from moving forward to hold the festival. Smithfield VA Events is truly disappointed to make this announcement. We will be working with our cancellation insurance company to deliver any potential refunds possible within the terms dictated by our policy. This will take some time to navigate, so please be kind and patient with us. It is our intention to be able to offer refunds if our claim is approved. We are currently focused on the priority of clearing the site and notifying all involved. We will post future updates and information on our website, SmithfieldVAEvents.com. 10/13/22 - Previous update:
Update 10/13/22: Good news, we have completed ALL the initial submission documents for filing the insurance claim. Now we wait.... Short explanation: Since this event cancellation was caused by a "justifiable reason" under our insurance cancellation policy, we will be able to fully refund everyone as soon as we get our insurance settlement. We hope to know more the end of next week from the insurance company and be able to provide you a more accurate timeline for refunds. Want more info....keep reading: The insurance company so far has been very responsive and we hope that our package was complete enough to not require too much back & forth and that we can get a settlement statement from them soon. They have confirmed receipt of our package and have said they hope to have the review done by the end of next week (so that would be about Oct. 21st. We appreciated everyone who is being kind and patient as we navigate this process. We hope to have it resolved soon, so we can begin the refund process to all ticket holders & sponsors. Our fest director will communicate directly with sponsors and for those who purchased tickets on-line be on the lookout for an email that we will be sending out via MailChimp. Check back here for future updates. 11/11/22 - Previous update
PREVIOUS UPDATE: 11/11/22: Short answer: We have been hoping to have resolution from the insurance company but GRRRR...we are still waiting. Long answer: We submitted our initial submission packet on 10/13/22. On 10/27/22, we were requested to submit additional documentation which we did on 10/31/22. The claims rep initially told us he would complete his review that week. However, he did not complete it until 11/8/22. His review and our package have now been forwarded to the claim adjustors. The rep is unable to give us a timeframe on the adjustor's response time, other than "it should be soon". Initially, the insurance company appeared to be very jazzy and "on-point", so we were hopeful that this process would not take too long. However, over the past few weeks, our optimism has been deflated. Not that this makes any of us feel any better, but we do tell you in our refund policy, "it can take 3-6 months for us to receive an insurance claim reimbursement check, which means refunds may be delayed that long as well". We are hopeful that is will only be another week or two. We appreciated your continued patience. We are just as anxious to get your refund to you, as you are to get it! As always, please feel free to contact us at [email protected] if you have additional questions that are not answered or in our info boxes on this page. |
