After 30 years of entertaining New Zealand, Wellington's only concert promotion company, Capital C: Concerts - who worked with Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi, Ozzy Osbourne and others - is closing its doors... the brand is being retired.
“Instead of passing my business onto my eldest son, I had to make him redundant, unemployed and now can’t even leave him anything more than a memory” says Phil Sprey owner of Capital C: Concerts, “like others in the arts and entertainment industries we are considered by this government as expendable.”
Sprey continues: "As a company we have entertained the population of NZ many times over. Bringing a range of international artist to the country and presenting them nationwide to small venues and equally to the biggest stadiums. Our rich history heralds such names as Sir Elton John, KISS, Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi, Moody Blues, Ozzy Osbourne, Poison, Lordi, Sol3mio, Peter Powers, Little River Band, Creedence Clear Water, Ivan Rebroff, Herman’s Hermits, The Searchers, Bananas in Pyjamas... events like the biggest ever ethnic festival, ‘Go Dutch’, The Dresses for Humanity - Diana’s Dresses Exhibition, The Disney Toy Exhibition, the first to tour the Anne Frank Exhibition in 1997 and the first ever ticketed event ‘Flora! Flora!’ at Government House... plus, many more. We have also proudly supported upcoming local artists and given millions of dollars to domestic charities whom we have linked to each major concert.
Until the start of COVID we specialized in major stadium sized concerts but in 2 years have had nothing, including no help from the Labour Government. We wrote to the PM and multiple ministers with no reply other than an auto-response saying they would get back to us. It never happened. We can’t even open a discussion, negotiation let alone contract an artist to come to NZ under the restrictions that have been imposed. There has been and still is no plan and then to top it off no assistance to keep the doors open. We have laid off all staff, cut back to the bone and have no reserves left. Our events also support venues, merchandisers, hospitality, accommodation, technical suppliers, ticketing agencies and a host of other business and people who rely on out work. All gone. The public too suffer. A whole generation of especially younger people in their late teens and twenties are going to lose traditional ‘rite of passage’ experiences that will never be regained. Many artist, due to age, Northern Hemisphere priorities etc, will now never come to NZ and even if everything went back to some sort of normality, won’t recover to the numbers and frequency of performances until at least 2025. And the lost income and therefore tax take... all missed.
The recent so called support package is only open to already announced events until early next year so the actual numbers of applicant are minimal. We haven’t been able to contract any artist as what are the rules of audience numbers and restrictions? What are the inbound MIQ criteria? When are the restrictions going to be changed or lifted? Try writing a legal and binding document with no clear guidelines from the government. And then there is no major cancellation insurance available.
Kiwis have been numbed into submission, they are gun-shy and even with the movement in the traffic light system are reluctant to return to public areas like accommodation, hospitality etc. Younger people are likely to return to entertainment first but older Kiwis will largely opt to stay at home or in smaller gatherings and then when will the mask era disappear? And then the axe dangling by government which still wants to keep the spectre of bringing back restrictions alive.
Was there a way to stay open? Yes. We outlined workable plans in 2020 to Jacinda and co. No reply. We repeated ideas and proposals on two other occasions... no one was listening.
The April 4th announcement leaving NZ in the 'RED' was the final straw...
So thanks NZ for supporting us and our touring artists over the years and while you can always enjoy music etc online, please return and support live events when they do return... hopefully soon." Phil Sprey - Owner, Capital C: Concerts
