As for the number of people attending, the organisers only offer the total number of people attending the four days of concerts. Eighty thousand people will pass through the Holika facilities from Thursday to Saturday. It is clear that this is much more than in previous years and this is noticeable in the venue (Mike Towers’ concert was packed with the main stage full to the rafters) and also in the city.
If last year the Guardia Civil estimated that 55,512 people attended the more than one hundred hours of music prepared, this year the forecasts spoke of the arrival of 80,000 people, which means tripling the city’s population. A figure that cannot be officially confirmed until Sunday but which can be sensed by the streets of the city which are packed with ‘holikers’ from early morning.
A thousand jobs
To achieve this, a legion of about a thousand people work directly every day in the organisation of Holika. The figure represents 43 percent more staff than two years ago when the company had 700 direct employees for its first festival in the city.
Waiters, private security personnel, a large team dedicated to controlling access that has been more agile than in any of the previous editions, assemblers, sound and light technicians, a large team of photographers and marketing personnel, those in charge of the different camps, own cleaning staff… It is estimated that there are around 300 waiters, 300 security personnel, 200 staff and another 200 for everything related to the infrastructure.
To all this we must add the personnel involved in the festival through the teams of each of the artists, which can be around 400 people, or the personnel of Calahorra companies that are in continuous contact with the organization to provide them with the necessary material. They have focused in particular on setting up the facilities days before, but this also involves the arrival of the diesel for the generators needed to start up the festival machinery or the food for the workers, which El Rincón Andaluz de Calahorra has been in charge of since last year.
In addition, many of these workers are young people from the area. “It is a good way to earn some money for the summer,” says one of the young people who serve drinks at the festival every night.
The investment in the festival (added to the investment made in Gran Reserva) is around 8 million euros, which doubles when quantifying the economic impact of the city, which is estimated at 15 million euros.
Although the hotel offer is not extensive in the city, the hotels have been full for days, not only in Calahorra but also in nearby towns. A total of 478 rooms have been reserved in the area for the festival staff alone.
Police deployment
To all this we must add the police deployment by the Civil Guard these days. If at the Gran Reserva festival, held last weekend, the security of the venue and its accesses was provided by 417 agents from different units, for Holika and the arrival of more than three times as many people, a group of more than 600 agents from different specialties has been activated, including citizen security units, USECIC and Traffic, Judicial Police, Information Service, agents specialized in anti-terrorism and explosives, Reserve and Security Group -GRS-, Canine Service with drug-detecting dogs, SEPRONA, Drone and Anti-drone Unit.
A security that is completed with the presence of Local Police and Civil Protection in charge of the Municipal Council that are present throughout the day.
An unprecedented deployment in the city that allows security to be guaranteed throughout four days in which only music has to be the protagonist of the event.