A Missouri music festival got canceled weeks before opening, underlining a 'risky business'

Treeline Music Festival in Columbia, Missouri, was supposed to feature popular bands like Japanese Breakfast, MUNA and Salt-N-Pepa. But the festival owners announced they would be calling off the event, citing low ticket sales and "significantly higher than expected expenses."
When organizers announced the cancellation of Columbia’s Treeline Music Fest, it joined a number of canceled music festivals in recent years in a risky industry where profits are hard to produce.

Organizers said in social media posts that “significantly higher than expected expenses” made it impossible to put on Treeline, which was formerly known as Roots N Blues.

Festival co-owners Tracy Lane and Shay Jasper told the Columbia Daily Tribune they wanted to avoid cancellation, but a combination of increased costs, decreased sponsorship money and ticket sales below pre-pandemic levels forced them to call off the event.

Treeline did not respond to Missouri Business Alert’s requests for comment.