You read it right: PS220 per night for a tiny windowless box at an EasyHotel in Princes Street, Edinburgh.
Even I, who spent the majority of my adult life living in Mumbai (a city famous for its small apartments and congested lanes), found this room to be a little too cramped.
This surreal situation is not a joke for Ali Woods. It’s the standard rate of August.
The accommodation costs have become a real embarrassment. The inflation has been a blatant exploitation for me. I’ve lived here for over ten years. The worst of capitalism. It’s true that at the fringe, everyone except the performers makes money. Woods told that the people responsible for making fringe what it has become are also expected to cover everyone else’s enjoyment.
The city streets outside my tiny room were a hive of activity with artists from all over the world: they handed out flyers to passers-by in the rain and opened venues in any available space, including pub cellars, shipping containers, grand theatres, etc.
During the Edinburgh Festival Fringe (1-25 August), the population of the city nearly doubles. Every spare bed, sofa, and windowless pod becomes a hot–and outrageously expensive–commodity.
Cultural behemoths and their economic shadow
By 2023, the festival featured 3,535 performances from more than 60 countries. In 2024 the festival will feature 3,746 performances from 60+ different countries. Over 2.6 millions tickets have been sold. This is the highest number in festival history.
Businesses in the local area benefited from this influx. In 2023, sales in cafes, restaurants and independent shops increased by up to 50%. Local businesses reported a 37% rise in sales by 2024. Food outlets and venues also saw record-highs.
The two middle weeks can be insane. In 2024, Zebra Coffee Co said that since 2020 it has been quiet and Fringe only picked up last year. Now it is back to “normal”.
Many small businesses still consider August to be the most profitable month of the year, with up to 40% their total annual revenue.
Helped me find an agent
The Fringe Festival can serve as a platform for performers.
It helped me find an agent. It is still a big industry, so I was able to make some good contacts. Woods adds that it has also helped him become a more accomplished comedian because he’s had 25 consecutive days with an hour of stage time without needing to travel.
The festival season in 2023 will support over 7,100 equivalent full-time jobs (FTEs) across Scotland. Nearly 6,000 are directly tied to the Fringe.
Students and freelancers can find jobs in the hospitality industry, marketing, technology, or PR.
The reality, however, is more complex. The majority are short-term and low-paid. They also have limited protections.
The Fringe Society responded by introducing a code of work practices in 2024. This encouraged affiliated venues to pay the Real Living Wage or more and offer proper training. Woods still has a complaint: the festival’s successes don’t reach everyone.
Stage time is expensive
Costs of staging a production have skyrocketed.
A survey by the Fringe Society found that in 2023, an average artist’s cost was £5,412, including travel, accommodations, venue rental, marketing and registration. Accommodation was widely regarded as the biggest obstacle in 2024.
- The average Airbnb price in August 2023 is between PS 1,450 and 1 700 per month.
- Airbnb’s average price in August 2024 is PS281 per person, per night. Prime flats can charge up to PS2,000 for a single room and one bedroom flats may reach PS9,000 a month (a 30% increase in just six years).
- Beds in hostels: 64 PS per night (1,920 PS/month).
Rent control is the big issue. Edinburgh is expensive, but you can get around it by cooking and drinking less. Room hire and public relations are expensive, but it’s not necessary to have a PR agency or to pay for a venue to attend the Fringe. Woods warns that, as accommodation costs continue to rise, both performers and audiences will be priced out.
Artists who are trying to make ends meet often resort to crowdsharing, sleep in vans and omit PR. Working-class creatives, those with disabilities, and young, early-career artists are the hardest-hit.
In 2023, the Fringe Artist Fund gave out PS195,000 worth of bursaries. The festival bursary programme grew in 2024 to PS450,000, with only 180 grants each of PS2,500. Demand far exceeds the available funding.
Veterans of the Fringe are honest: “Doing the Fringe is a gamble if you do not have much money.” The cost of getting here, paying to stay and renting the venue is so high.
Public financing and policy responses
The Scottish Government announced that it will provide PS300,000.00 in direct funding to the 2025/26 Festival, in response to increasing pressures in 2024. This is in addition of the grant assistance previously provided and recognises the economic and cultural importance of the festival.
The Scottish Government has committed itself to work with all of its partners, including the Fringe Society…to safeguard the future and reputation of the Edinburgh Fringe in the world as an internationally renowned cultural institution built upon the principles of open access. This was stated by Deputy First-Minister Kate Forbes back in April 2024.
CEO Shona Mccarthy added, “This is undoubtedly a great contribution to Scotland’s society, economy and cultural sector. We hope that this will be a step in the direction of long-term financing for the Fringe Society.”
Housing crunch: increasing rents and displacement of residents
Airbnb, for example, saw an explosion of listings in August 2023. The month before the festival, alone, there was a 31% increase.
The influx of rental properties, which are aimed at accommodating the thousands of tourists who flood Edinburgh in August each year, is having a ripple-effect on the housing market.
Rental prices in Edinburgh are on the rise as landlords turn long-term rentals into short-term accommodation. This has led to a significant reduction of housing supply for residents who depend on stable, affordable housing.
James Knight, a resident, tells Invezz:
I live in Stockbridge, a part of Edinburgh that is posh and about 20 minutes away from Waverley. As a result, many of my flats are empty for most of the time. Walking down the street, it’s amazing to see how many flats are empty. Clusters of lockboxes, which indicate properties that are rarely used except for the Fringe Festival. These homes are only rented out to take advantage of the Fringe Festival, which drives up prices for all. The neighbour next door is an example. They have a licence to rent for 12 weeks per year but their home sits vacant the rest of the time. The city is seriously damaged by this practice.
According to a briefing from the Scottish Parliament for 2024, approximately 1 in 5 residents of central Edinburgh complain about noise disturbances during the Festival period.
More concerning, over half the residents of these neighbourhoods feel “pushed out” during festival week. This is a result of rising prices and an overwhelming number of tourists and short-term rentals that change the affordability and character of the communities.
The city leadership publicly recognized that these pressures on housing were a danger to the social fabric of the city.
Edinburgh Council leader Cammy Day issued a warning in March 2024.
The festival economy cannot make it unaffordable to the residents and workers of the city.
He stressed the need for a more robust response, noting recent measures to tighten licensing restrictions on short-term rental properties but admitting that they are still insufficient.
It was a day to call for more government assistance in advancing policies aimed at addressing affordability and renting regulations, underlining how important it is to protect long-term residences from being priced-out by festival-driven housing growth.
As a result, in 2024 stricter requirements will be implemented for the licensing of short-term rentals and a tighter enforcement plan regulations.
Critics have noted that the enforcement is often inconsistent and reactive. It struggles to keep up with the rapid growth of short-term listing during the festival.
Edinburgh’s ongoing challenge is to find a balance between the economic gains of the largest arts festival in the world and the need for affordable housing.
Infrastructure under pressure: Pressure on Public Services
Lothian Buses reported service delays of between 16 and 20 percent on key routes in both August 2023 as well as 2024.
Buses have been struggling to keep up with the surge in ridership, resulting in overcrowding, and frustration for both locals and visitors.
Edinburgh Waverley Station, the main railway hub of the city, also reaches its maximum operational capacity at the Festival.
Recent data indicates that up to 80,000 passengers arrive daily at the station in August. This makes it one of the busiest stations in the UK for the Festival period.
Waverley faces logistical difficulties due to the sheer number of people arriving, leaving, or transiting. This requires coordinated efforts from rail operators, city authorities, and security.
The festival’s crowds also affect the healthcare services. NHS Lothian has reported a 11% increase in Accident & Emergency Admissions (A&Es) during August 2023.
These cases are often related to festival incidents such as injuries, alcohol consumption, or exhaustion. This puts additional pressure on hospitals already overstretched during busy times.
The pressure on healthcare services is a reflection of the wider effects that seasonal increases in population have on public service.
The city also had to hire hundreds of temporary workers to help with waste collection, sanitation and street cleaning during the festival.
Residents and visitors alike have complained about the neglect of some streets during busy festivals. Overflowing bins and pavements littered with trash, as well as delayed maintenance, are common complaints.
It is evident that the city’s infrastructure and amenities are suffering from the Fringe.
Who Benefits and who Pays the Price?
The Edinburgh Fringe Festival brings tens and tens millions of pounds to the local economy, while also raising the cultural profile of the city on a worldwide scale. However, its financial benefit is distributed in a very uneven manner.
The festival revenue is often dominated by large privately-owned venues, hospitality chains and vacation rental platforms.
The concentration of profit contrasts sharply with the hardships faced by many performers who face high costs to perform, as well as by the residents, who are forced to pay higher rents and deal with increasing service demands.
The impact of Fringe has been assessed in more formal ways, and this divide is not unnoticed.
Creative Scotland’s 2023 audit identified the festival both as an economic “powerhouse” and “pressure point,” and highlighted systemic barriers which prevent artists from diverse backgrounds and community to fully participate.
The barriers are a result of affordability issues and exclusionary impacts of the rising cost of living.
Edinburgh and Scotland face a serious policy challenge because of the disconnect between economic benefits and social costs.
The success of the Fringe Festival could worsen existing inequality in the city if it is not accompanied by mechanisms like a tourism levy, or reinvestment into housing and city services.
The verdict: Boom, Backlash and the Balance of a City
The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which will run from 2023 to 2024 in Scotland’s capital city, has proven to be a powerful driver for economic activity as well as a source of global prestige.
The project has created thousands of new jobs and boosted local business. It also put Edinburgh on the map of international art festivals. This same success, however, has revealed deep tensions around affordability, sustainability, and livability.
This extraordinary event presents a number of challenges for local artists, residents and service providers.
As the festival grows, it creates displacement anxiety, strain on infrastructure, and an increasing gap between those who benefit and pay.
This joke, which says that everyone makes money except the performers, captures the real concern of many that the magic and spirit of the Fringe Festival is slipping out of reach for those who define it.
To ensure the future of Fringe as an inclusive, sustainable and truly cultural landmark requires deliberate policies.
To regulate housing, to support artists, to improve public services and to fairly distribute economic gain, it will require coordinated efforts.
The success of this festival, and the well-being of the city in which it is held, depends on finding the right balance between the booms and the backlash.
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