Billy McFarland ‘QUITS’ as Fyre Fest boss and puts brand up for sale after disastrous attempts to host second event
FYRE Festival creator Billy McFarland announced he is selling his infamous festival to start a ‘new chapter.’
McFarland posted a lengthy statement on Instagram detailing what the future of the festival will look like.
The Fyre Festival founder said he’s spent the past couple of years pouring “everything into bringing Fyre back with honesty, transparency, relentless effort, and creativity.”
McFarland wrote that the festival has worked on “rebuilding trust” with the community after the disasturous event in 2017 where guests were left with inadequate accommodation due to a lack of organization.
The festival made headlines in the Netflix documentary FYRE: The Greatest Festival that Never Happened, and Hulu’s documentary Fyre.
The founder wrote that the “brand is bigger than any one person” and bigger than what I’m able to lead on my own.”
He called Fyre Festival “one of the most powerful attention engines in the world” and said he decided the best way to save it moving forward is to sell the brand as a whole.
The sale will include its “trademarks, IP, digital assets, media reach, and cultural capital.”
The announcement comes just months before Fyre Festival 2 was set to take place in Isla Mujeres from May 30-June 2.
The location was later switched to Playa del Carmen in Mexcio.
Tickets to the event were being sold for $1,400 for one person, not including accommodations or travel, to $1.1 million, which organizers claimed covered eight people.
However, on April 2, Mexican officials said “after a thorough review, there is no record or planning of any such event in the municipality,” causing the festival to postpone its May 30 start date.
McFarland wrote in his letter that the “challenges faced in Mexico” led to several Caribbean islands “eager” to host the next festival.
“While I’m incredibly excited, I can’t risk a repeat of what happened in Playa Del Carmen, where support quickly turned into public distancing once media attention intensified,” he wrote.
“For FYRE Festival 2 to succeed, it’s clear that I need to step back and allow a new team to move forward independently, bringing the vision to life on this incredible island.”
McFarland said wrote, “Giving control of the brand to a new group is the most responsible way to follow through on what we set out to do: build a global entertainment brand, host a safe and legendary event, and continue to pay restitution to those who are owed from the first festival.”
He ended his statement by thanking all of his supporters along the way and telling interested buyers to visit the Fyre Festival website.
The Fyre Festival founder did not give any more information on when and where Fyre 2 would happen, but he promised it would be “bigger, better, and built to last without [him] at the helm.”
Billy McFarland statement
When my team and I launched FYRE Festival 2, it was about two things: finishing what I started and making things right.
Over the past two years, we’ve poured everything into bringing FYRE back with honesty, transparency, relentless effort, and creativity. We’ve taken the long road to rebuilding trust. We rebuilt momentum. And we proved one thing without a doubt:
FYRE is one of the most powerful attention engines in the world.
Since 2017, FYRE has dominated headlines, documentaries, and conversations as one of the world’s most talked-about music festivals. We knew that FYRE was big, but we didn’t realize just how massive the wave would become. That wave has brought us here: to a point where we know it’s time to call for assistance.
This brand is bigger than any one person and bigger than what I’m able to lead on my own. It’s a movement. And it deserves a team with the scale, experience, and infrastructure to realize its potential.
We have decided the best way to accomplish our goals is to sell the FYRE Festival brand, including its trademarks, IP, digital assets, media reach, and cultural capital – to an operator that can fully realize its vision.
There is a clear path for operators and entrepreneurs with strong domain expertise to build FYRE into a global force in entertainment, media, fashion, CPG, and more. For example, in the two years since we’ve re-launched FYRE Festival, Hollywood and entertainment executives have already licensed the brand to develop properties specifically in theatre, music streaming, and Free Ad-Supported TV.
In addition, following the challenges we faced in Mexico, we were approached by several Caribbean destinations eager to host FYRE Festival 2. We dove into the process—meeting with national officials, conducting site visits—and we’re confident we’ve found the ideal location for the festival. While I’m incredibly excited, I can’t risk a repeat of what happened in Playa Del Carmen, where support quickly turned into public distancing once media attention intensified. For FYRE Festival 2 to succeed, it’s clear that I need to step back and allow a new team to move forward independently, bringing the vision to life on this incredible island.
I’ve stood by my team, our partners, and our fans since Day 1 of FYRE Festival 2. Giving control of the brand to a new group is the most responsible way to follow through on what we set out to do: build a global entertainment brand, host a safe and legendary event, and continue to pay restitution to those who are owed from the first festival.
To the supporters, believers, and builders who’ve stuck with my team and me: thank you. We will pick the new group based on their ability to execute the vision of FYRE in a transparent, grand, and expeditious manner. The next chapter of FYRE will be bigger, better, and built to last without me at the helm.
Interested buyers can learn more at FYRE.MX
Sincerely,
Billy McFarland
FYRE FRIGHT
The Guardian previously referred to the 2017 Fyre festival as “closer to The Hunger Games … than Coachella.”
The event was advertised by popular influencers and models such as Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid and Hailey Baldwin.
Tickets cost up to $100,000, and promised guests “the best in food, art, music and adventure” in the Bahamas.
The reality, however, was much less glamorous.
Guests who paid hundreds to thousands of dollars were given poorly made sandwiches and were left stranded on an island in the Bahamas without proper access to water and shelter.
Local business owners were also left stranded and broke after the festival deserted the island.
FYRE Festival & Billy McFarland
The inaugural FYRE Festival remains one of the most infamous event disasters in history.
Attendees were left devastated after spending tens of thousands of dollars to attend the event, only to arrive on an island in the Bahamas lacking food, water, and accommodation- not to mention the musical acts all pulled out at the last minute.
The debacle was magnified by social media, with disgruntled influencers sharing their outrage after stepping onto Great Exuma expecting the party of a lifetime.
Instead of the promised luxury villas, festival-goers were greeted by re-purposed emergency FEMA tents.
Enticed by the allure of world-class cuisine, ticket holders found themselves served cold cheese sandwiches in foam containers.
Despite the spectacular failure, Billy exclusively told The U.S. Sun in an interview that he has his reasons for attempting the event a second time.
Billy said: “This is the most tangible way to repay the $26 million that I owe, and having real partners gives an opportunity in the next five to seven years, to actually pay back that $26 million.
“And unfortunately, no one’s offering me $26 million to work somewhere else.”
The convicted felon, who faced charges for misleading his investors, went on to say he is taking full advantage of his notoriety.
“We are literally the most talked about music festival in the world. We’ve had three times as many mentioned this Coachella, which is in second place and there’s a huge drop-off after that.
“It’s an incredible opportunity to steer that ship into the storm and embrace everything that’s happened.”
“They had engaged with so much of the local community to try and pull this off. There were hundreds of day labourers working,” Chris Smith, who directed the Netflix documentary, told BBC.
“What was most surprising to me was going to the Bahamas and seeing the aftermath of what was left behind and the effect on the people there.”
Smith said he talked to one restaurant owner who spent $50,000 of her life savings to afford the festival’s catering.
“In the end, when things fell apart everyone just left. She was left having to deal with this,” Smith said.
“Nobody went back to deal with that and that people moved on and came back to living their lives in New York and didn’t own up to the responsibility of their actions.”
The event resulted in McFarland being convicted of fraud and sentenced to six years in prison where he was later released after less than four years.
In 2021, some attendees were awarded money in a $2 million class-action settlement.
Vanity Fair called the 33-year-old the “the poster boy for millennial scamming.”
McFarland was released from prison on March 30, 2022 and later announced Fyre Festival 2 in September 2024.
“We have the chance to embrace this storm and really steer our ship into all the chaos that has happened, and if it’s done well, I think Fyre has a chance to be this annual festival that really takes over the festival industry,” he said when announcing the second festival.