Eurosonic Noorderslag and PlayPass announce technology partnership
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Eurosonic Noorderslag (ESNS), Europe’s largest showcase of emerging music acts, has announced a partnership with PlayPass that will see a new integrated digital payment solution rolled-out across its 42 venues in the city of Groningen.
All fans, delegates and artists in attendance will be able to make payments at all the official ESNS locations using their choice of an NFC wristband, a mobile wallet or any payment card. To ensure a frictionless customer journey for all types of attendee, these digital payment options will all be accepted on a single POS device, provided by PlayPass, which will empower the event organisers with a unified data set for sales and consumption.
The NFC wearables option, for which PlayPass has gained its world-leading track record for reliability in the live events space is available to all event visitors who will be issued with a personalised electronic wristband on registration. They can use their wristband, fitted with an NFC tag, as their cashless payment device.
Funds can be loaded to these wristbands in a variety of ways. Visitors from the Netherlands and Belgium can top-up via the Payconiq mobile application, a popular form of digital payment in those countries. Another option is PlayPass’ new Self-Service Topup kiosks, designed for festivals and optimised for speed. Should delegates wish to take advantage of incentive offers and load funds before arriving, they can register an online personal account. This can also be used on their smartphone to keep track of their spend history and topup credit as needed, on the move.
In co-operation with Eurosonic Noorderslag, PlayPass will also invite event promoters in attendance to a behind-the-scenes tour of its market-leading technology and operation, including a sneak peak at the data reports generated in real time.
“We are very proud to become a partner to Eurosonic Noorderslag and are extremely excited to be showcasing new capabilities at such a prestigious event”, says David De Wever, CEO and co-founder of PlayPass. “To date we have focused on providing a reliable system for events to decrease costs and optimise revenue – case-in-point, enabling on-site top-ups via QR-code from Payconiq. Now we are advancing to our next evolution which is about adding direct value by creating longer-term visitor relationships and unlocking new monetisation opportunitie. We believe that the features we are presenting at Eurosonic will be a true game-changer for the live events industry and we look forward to showing promoters how they can yield significant gains, both financial and in visitor loyalty, through intelligent use of our technology and the invaluable data it generates.”
Dago Houben, managing director from Eurosonic Noorderslag says, “ESNS believes it is important to lead the way in innovations in the music industry. Every year we challenge our partners to embrace this idea and lead us into the future. In 2013, we were one of the first festivals to introduce cashless payments at our event. The idea was to prove that if cashless payments could work on such a complicated, city wide event, it could also work in a standard festival or event setup. Over the years we have proven to be right and have made the system profitable for all venues, our guests and ESNS itself. It is now time to make the next step and improve on every aspect. With the state of the art system that PlayPass provides, we feel confident improving the quality of payments and services on all levels and for all involved. Frontstage, backstage, in reporting and administration.”
ESNS 2019 attracted over 40,000 guests from 44 countries, including 4,100 conference delegates and representatives from 423 festivals. 342 acts were showcased across more than 40 stages. The 35th of edition of ESNS will take place from 15 to 18 January 2020.
