The Big Green Gathering sent out the following message this week describing their situation:

Urgent help needed - BGG in danger of financial collapse

As we noted in the programme for this year's Big Green Gathering,
licence conditions imposed by Mendip District Council and Avon &
Somerset Police added around £120,000 to the costs of this year's event.
Now that the bills have all come in, it is clear that rather than the
profit we might otherwise have expected, these extra costs have left us
with a loss of £75,000 this year.

Having already built up a defecit of similar proportions in 2005 and
2006, this means that the Big Green Gathering Co. Ltd. now has debts
exceeding its assets by around £150,000, and will have to declare itself
bankrupt unless we can urgently raise at least £100,000 to stay in
business (we already have a £50,000 overdraft guarantee in place, and
our guarantor is prepared to stand by us if we can raise the balance).

These may seem like frighteningly huge sums, but are only a fraction of
our annual turnover of around three quarters of a million pounds. The
total 3-year loss is still less than £10 each for everyone who attended
this year's Gathering. Provided we can prevent future costs continuing
to escalate as they have in the past couple of years, the situation
should still be recoverable if we can get through the present crisis. On
the other hand, if we were to default on our creditors now, and the
company went under, it would probably be impossible to re-start the
event without a start-up capital of at least a quarter of a million
pounds.

There is only limited time in which to act. Bills are already overdue
for payment, and our creditors need to have confidence that we can sort
ourselves out to prevent any of them petitioning for the company to be
wound up. To create that confidence, we need to have raised substantial
funds by the end of this month, and to know that we are definitely in a
position to carry on well before our Annual General Meeting in November.

Please act now to do whatever you can to help save the Big Green
Gathering.

Donations may be sent by cheque to BGG, 10 St Johns Sq., Glastonbury BA6
9LJ, or made on line via the new donations page on our website. [Please
note that cheques are preferable, as on-line donations are subject to a
4.5% processing fee and a 30-day delay.] Cheques will not be banked
unless and until the directors consider that sufficient has been
received to give us a realistic chance of avoiding bankruptcy.
Pledges of large amounts, whether as donations or loans, should be sent
by email to  kerry@big-green-gathering.com, as should any other ideas or
suggestions for rescuing the situation.