Hastings Pier Hastings reviews by real event-goers

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Rip off tickets at Look-A-Like Festival in Hastings. Overpriced drinks, inedible food and a VIP area that has no decent view of the stage. What the very f***?

Many upset VIP people here saying the same. Paid for VIP queue jump and made to wait in the queue - apparently, because there weren't enough staff to manage queue jumping access 😳

Cheap plastic glasses for a windy setting means lots of peoples' drinks are blowing away and they're then having to buy more over-priced drinks that have just been blown into the decking. VIP?? if sitting in a very windy, glass screened box is VIP, then I've been mislead. My heart broke when I watched another customer tipping a small bottle of water away because of the no food and no drink entrance policy. Employers have to provide water for employees so surely a festival can allow a small bottle of water for a customer - it's the liquid of life and a basic necessity. Most people that come to a festival want to buy alcohol, so let them bring in a free bottle of water for goodness sake. The only VIP benefit I got was a shorter queue to the plastic foliage encrusted toilet, but that's not worth 80 quid to wipe my rear with super eco loo roll!

I booked my tickets in February expecting a promised lineup and the majority of lookalike artists described are not here - angry is not how I would describe it. Wait time between artists was inexcusably long. Security and event organisers more bothered about people sitting down than stopping people smoking and vaping on the aging, dried out combustible pier.

Don't waste your money. Get a deal last minute on Groupon or Wowcher.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Billed as a family festival, it certainly DID NOT cater for a mixed age group. Venue and Music great, but we had to leave with a tired 4 year old as we were not allowed to visit the fairground attractions on the entrance to the pier and return to the venue. The food outlets were mainly closed with horrendous queues, the VIP area was totally over crowded. Love the concept but allow families to come and go. We really wanted to see the later bands but with the last entry at 5pm and no re-entry we simply had to cut our losses and leave.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Got settled with friends on camping chairs, only to be told very early on that if we wanted to sit, we had to go much further back behind a hut! Close to the portaloos!!! No view and reduced sound. Only to find when we decided to leave as wind was much worse further back, that we were probably one of the few compliant patrons...lots of people still sitting where they were, near the front. Beer had run out early afternoon. Expect to pay inflated prices, but for drinks that were not what we wanted?? What a shame. Highly disappointing.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Started off ok, entrance didn't take long having arrived at 130pm, found a space where most were sitting on chairs and blankets, lovely.
Then more and more people turn up and 3 hours after we arrived we're told by security that we must be standing and not allowed to use chairs or blankets, and were told to sit at the back of the venue or leave.
When people refused, the security "gang", who were precisely that given the way they tried to handle the situation by intimidation in numbers against predominantly older customers (one lady in her 80's) totally ruined the whole atmosphere, and didn't seem to know how to deal with people who were having a good time and we're in no way a threat or antisocial, and that doesn't create any confidence that they could handle a situation on the opposite end of the spectrum, the whole experience ended up akin to cattle being herded in to be milked of money, and the actual experience provided was of little importance to whoever was making the money.
So no, unless the insecure security "gang" learn that 9 people to speak with one customer is overkill to say the least and unnecessarily intimidating, and the money grabbers put more thought into the actual experience from a customers perspective and stop treating us like cattle, I, we and most likely many other people will not be looking to return any time soon, its a shame, as its a lovely venue.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

I've emailed my complaint this morning. False advertising, rip-off prices and an event that bared no resemblance to the event I booked.

Review of Save The Rave: Outdoor 90's Festival to Hastings

The drinks are expensive 7.50 vodka and c**e there was no cover when it was raining and the Dj did not even turn up for some of the event they just had a playlist playing at one point it was freezing with no cover from the elements very disappointing

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

My boyfriend and I were so looking forward to a weekend away as we both work very long hours and love a tribute act and Hastings. There was no set times at all for this, acts were added with no notice so you didn't know who you'd see! The security were terrible and had no interest in people smoking drugs in the designated smoking area. There were huge gaps between bands. The bars ran out of draughts and wine by 3 with no signage saying this afternoon queuing for over 25 minutes and unfortunately most of the bar staff were extremely unhelpful and often sarcastic and rude, when you don't get anyone more polite than me! The whole day was chaotic and shambolic and the no re-entry was ridiculous as running out of cash, or wanting something to eat, as most stalls again had sold out of everything, made this impossible. Absolutely awful time and if I could, I'd ask for my money back as this actually ruined our weekend. So unhappy as were 100's of people around me. I went to a Garage festival last year and absolutely no problems at all. Had a wonderful time! Definitely not recommending this to anyone.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

There was very little seating available, people who brought their own camp chairs were moved to the rear of the pier? There were really long queues for everything, from getting into the venue to getting a drink to going to the toilets. The music line up should have been pre announced to enable us to plan our day as once you left the venue you couldn't return. In a nutshell the entire experience was a complete waste of time and money...

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

The event was good value for money, the acts were great for the price. The food stalls could have been better organised, most of them ran out something before the last couple of acts and the queues were quite long. The only major complaint was that the sound engineer frequently messed up the microphone and instrument levels during the acts. It made it quite hard to hear and put the performers off. The Queen tribute (the headliner!) had to stall while the mic was sorted for Freddie as it wasn't working when he made his entrance. Pretty poor that the issues were pointed out and continued the entire day. Nothing bad to say about the actual acts and they handled the technical problems well.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Choice of only Bud or Red Stripe if you want beer, at £5 a can. Not great. What was described as food trucks might be stretching it a bit.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

11 bands advertised for the line-up, only 7 actually played, of which only 4 were of the advertised line-up. VIP area was BEHIND the stage so can't actually see the bands. Lift broken so disabled member of our party wasn't actually able to enter the VIP area that we paid for. Draught beer ran out by 3pm. All drinks overpriced. Minimal food options (only doughnuts, chicken nuggets, chips and burgers) and no ability to leave and return to seek alternative food so we actually went the entire 10 hour day without eating. Utterly disgusted with the organisation and VIP was completely pointless. The only upside to it was nicer toilets.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

I was new to this event & the venue. I wasn't aware that there would be very restricted seating. We had to leave early because of this. Plenty of opportunity to 'rent' chairs etc. & plenty of space for more seating. For the price of the tickets more information before the event would be good. Would be more prepared next year if it is scheduled again.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Security where disgusting and rude, several acts cancelled and we where not informed ( these where the acts we where looking forward to ) Only a couple food let's opened queue took an hour to be told only chips available !! ) Several bats ran out of drinks ( only an hour in to the 10 hour day ) Was meant to be a birthday treat for our 15 year old son and it was an utter waste of time and money

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

The music bands Elton, Abba and Spice girls were great. Where were the other bands advertised However from the start security staff emptied your water bottles at the entrance, and threw a couple of snacks away which you couldn't purchase any how. There was no draft beers, they had all run out. The food had run out, ques for the food took over an hour. People who were seated near the front had to move, half way through the event for safety, but surely this could have easily been signposted or advised before hand. There were only warm Budweiser and Red Stripe beers to drink out of cans at exorbitant prices. The organising management need to take a serious look at themselves. Despite this we enjoyed ourselves, but it was the crowd who made it not the event organisers.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Absolute joke. Not enough food places (3 total unless you wanted doughnuts) leading to long waits for food which was rushed and therefore poor quality. Tribute acts were awful with the exception of Elton John who was decent. The Beatles and Spice Girls were particularly bad, off key, amateurish and actually painful to listen to. A lot of people packed up and left, we left before ABBA and Queen because we just couldn't deal with it any longer. 3 of the atcts (Oasis,Bowie and Fleetwood Mac) pulled out, I can only assume they saw the others and refused to be associated with it. The bar ran out of beer by 8pm. They oversold the "VIP" tickets leading to big queues for toilets. I would feel ripped off if I'd paid a tenner but as it I'd I feel utterly shafted. I wouldn't go again if my life depended on it.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Good atmosphere, large crowd. Plenty of bar staff however same as previous event poor choice of drinks available.
Seemed large gaps upto 40 mins between groups & not as many as advertised on the day.
Elton John & ABBA tributes very good, Spice Girls poor.

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Very poor organization. Ran out of food, and draft beer. Vip area was behind the stage

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

Hi the music was amazing. Shame that the hastings pier ran out of food and drink and no one was allowed to go out to get food for themselves and their children and come back in. Which I feel is so bad when we have paid for food and drinks to be available. Lots of people also have complained. Also considering the young being there, abba queen and a few others should of been on first not at the end as most of music played they did not know even myself. Also 3 bands did not come which they put other in place. I cannot fault the look a likes they were amazing. I was really upset when I told door staff I needed to take my 81 year old mother home as she was cold and hungry and no food was there as ran out, and I was coming back. They said no re entry. That was really bad people paid to be there all day with food and drink. It ran out by 5pm ish the organisers on hasting pier did not cover for the amount of people that were there. They knew how many tickets that sold so I was very unhappy. So many people left way before the end because of this. I did not get the chance to watch the bands I wanted to see and get food and drinks for my family. So disappointed. The only thing that was good was the amazing look a likes can't fault them. Just the managers of the pier that didn't do things right and make sure you could eat and drink. There were many food stales not open too which there was only two food places open and the time to wait for food was to long then to be told there was nothing left Not good at all. I would love the festival to be somewhere else in Hastings. The old town stade did a free music festival on the start of our carnival week it was amazing enough food and drink and you were able to go out and get food and come back. The organisers made sure there was enough food and drink for hundreds of people that attended. I'm sorry for my review. I will be buying tickets from yourselves in the future just hope you find better places with better organisers for future events. I missed all the bands I really wanted to see and that was such a disappointment. So my review is the best I can give. So sorry.
Natalie

Review of Outdoor Tribute Festival comes to Hastings!

The whole experience was amazing except for the fact we arrived around 2.00 and the draught beer was starting to run out! By 2.45 there was no draught beer to be had anywhere! We were then charged £6.50 for a can of bud and £4 for soft drink. The cans soon became warm cans as the bar’s obviously couldn’t get them cold quickly enough for the demand. Such a shame as everyone getting angry about this and just took the edge off the day.