Portable buildings being 'craned' into Temple Newsam in readiness for the three-day Leeds Carling Festival which opens on Friday.
Directing the mammoth operation is Charles Lister, who heads the music events division of portable buildings group William G. Search Ltd, which is providing over 250 units on the Carling Festival sites at Leeds and Reading this weekend.
It is a role, which has earned 36-year-old Charlie, who lives in Harrogate, the title of 'Mr Music' because wherever there is a festival, be it folk, pop or classical, Charlie is inevitably there, heading up a team from the Leeds-based Search group.
The group is providing 110 portable buildings for the Leeds Festival, which will be used as production offices, dressing rooms, police operation offices along with 15 self-contained toilet units for onsite staff, artists, performers and guests. More than 20 golf buggies are also being provided for the onsite staff.
Since it was formed 10 years ago, the group's music events division has been a major success story and has won around over 75% of the music industry's business. When combined together with the sporting events section of the division the company is by far the largest supplier of such facilities to the outdoor events industry.
Earlier this year it was responsible for portable toilets and accommodation at the BBC's Golden Jubilee concerts at Buckingham Palace and the portable toilets for the thousands who took part in the celebrations in The Mall and other sites in central London as well as the facilities for the Wimbledon championships.
"It has been a particularly busy year for us," said Charlie who is also responsible for setting up portable accommodation at the Reading Carling Festival which also takes place this weekend and where Search provide all the public toilets; 58 mains operated toilet units which equates to 310 WC's and over 120 metres of urinals.
"Our introduction to the music industry was in 1993 for the U2 concert in Roundhay Park and from then on we have emerged as the country's leading supplier of equipment within this particular field," said Charlie. Last weekend he was working at the V2002 festivals at Chelmsford and Weston Park.
Over 250,000 people are expected to attend the Leeds and Reading festivals with Guns n' Roses returning to the UK for the first time in nine years to perform at Leeds on Friday night.
For further information please contact:
Charles Lister at William G. Search Ltd
Tel: 07836 625511
Les Able at Simon Mountford Communications
Tel: 01347 844844
