Staying one step ahead of the storm with real-time updates ⛈️
A seamless integration between VIKIN and Crescat ensured that Greenbelt could get changes to programming into the hands of attendees quickly when the severe August Bank Holiday weather took hold of the UK, with push notifications getting urgent updates out quicker than social media.
- Event type
- Music Festival
- Location
- Kettering, UK
- Duration
- Four days
- Partnership
- 2025-2026, returning in 2027
The impact for the event
- Organisers could rely on a seamless integration between Crescat and VIKIN, so programming changes could be made in a single location for all attendee-facing platforms.
- Attendees could rely on the app containing the most up-to-date programming information, so they could plan their days, despite the bad weather and poor signal.
- Notoriously poor phone reception wasn't a barrier to effective and timely event communications.
- VIKIN will return to support Greenbelt's 'Between The Fields' program in 2027.
Starting in 2025…
Greenbelt chose VIKIN Event Apps as their app provider back in 2025, after the closure of their previous provider. Greenbelt were looking for something new that:
- Has features that their audience would find value in, such as timeline features, interactive maps, personalised schedule building and rich detailed profiles for speakers, talks and workshops
- Gave the organising team the ability to get updates out to attendees quickly, with full knowledge that the Boughton House phone reception struggled on event days
- Provided the event with tools to send push notifications directly out to attendees before, during, and after the event
- Synced seamlessly with Crescat, their event operations management tool of choice, so they could keep their event data in a single place.
One of the most important things for Greenbelt in 2025 was that whichever app provider they went with needed to connect with Crescat, meaning that the organising team did not have to duplicate data whenever things changed.
Greenbelt joined VIKIN in 2025, and shortly after we completed our official integration with Crescat, beginning our partnership with the Crescat team. Our platform pulls data, via the official API directly from Crescat, and formats the data into the right structure which can then be distributed via VIKIN’s content distribution systems to the attendee app. The VIKIN platform sits between Crescat and the attendee apps, allowing our infrastructure to the efficiently handle getting content changes out to attendees using the minimal amount of bandwidth.
The organising team had a seamless experience: sending push notifications to communicate with attendees, using the Crescat integration to get programming changes directly into the hands of attendees, and our on-site support service remained on standby to answer any app questions or diagnose any issues.
With a perfect performance at Greenbelt in 2025, VIKIN was scheduled to return in 2026.
In the summer of 2026, the UK entered a prolonged drought, and festival planning was focusing on fire prevention, heat management, and attendee welfare. In the run-up to the event, Greenbelt used the app to send out push notifications about barbecue bans, fire safety advice, and dust warnings.
On the event days however, the plans started to change.
The August Bank Holiday Storms
In the run up to the festival, there were some early signs that the event days were due to be a bit wetter than originally anticipated. On the final setup day, when the VIKIN on-site support team arrived to use the new Backstage organiser app to finalise on event map locations, the skies started to open.
The skies then stayed open for the entire weekend, turning a previously dry and dusty field in Northamptonshire into a mudbath.
This left the organisers with more than a few problems:
- Some activities were weather dependent, and the weather had given a firm answer that those activities needed rescheduling
- Attendees had already built their personalised schedule in advance, and needed to be kept informed when things moved and plans changed
- The amount of programming moving around was a lot for a small team to handle, and everywhere visible to attendees needed to match
- Impacts of the weather on the site changed how attendees could access and move around the site
Most importantly: the problems weren’t going to go away - attendees were already on site, tents had been pitched, and programming had already started.
The organisers however, already had the right tools at their disposal.
The features that made an impact
Keep Your Systems Connected
Our official integration with Crescat kept attendees in the loop with changes to programming, and saved organisers valuable time by not having to keep multiple systems independently updated.
Effortless Content Management
With content constantly changing, the organisers needed tools that just worked. By using the VIKIN portal for push notifications, partner announcements, and news posts; using Backstage for location changes; and Crescat for programming changes, the organising team could make rapid changes without needing to call for support.
Everything Available Offline
All of the information that Greenbelt attendees could have needed stayed available, even when the reception at Boughton House worsened. All information - artist details, vendor profiles, daily schedules, personalised plans, sponsor details and more - all remained available, with our content distribution infrastructure then getting updates to attendees' apps, even with unreliable phone signal.
Talk Directly To Attendees
The Greenbelt organisers were able to send push notifications directly to attendees to share important programming and safety related communications. Attendees were able to instantly receive these notifications, even when signal was poor.
Help Attendees Plan
Greenbelt attendees love to plan their time on site. Whilst attendees had planned in advance, with changes to programming, it was important the app could get updates to attendees could revise their daily schedule. Some of our most common feedback is sharing positive stories of how our planning features help attendees get the most from Greenbelt
Keep Information In One Place
All festival information - setlist times, workshop information, talk schedules, personalised schedules, maps, and other practical event info were all available in a single location, so attendees didn't need to go looking to find what they needed.
How VIKIN and Crescat helped
Crescat is an event management platform, designed for festivals to centralise their planning and production of their whole event. This meant that amongst other things, programming and scheduling were kept in one place, not countless spreadsheets or duplicated between different platforms.
Greenbelt were already familiar with the Crescat platform, having used Crescat since 2024 for their event operations.
The official Crescat integration for the VIKIN platform was launched in the summer of 2025, allowing events that use Crescat to seamlessly sync their event production data into their VIKIN app. The integration makes it possible to sync countless things over into an event’s app:
- Entire event schedules
- Artist profiles - including photos, descriptions, quotes, social links, YouTube video previews, linked speakers and more
- Genre, event categories, subcategories and other filters
- Venue and location details
- Other custom data specific to a given festival.
Most importantly, Crescat remains the source-of-truth for the app: organisers only have to update programming in Crescat and then it’ll sync into the app. Organisers remain in control too, as data can remain in draft until they’re ready for it to be published.
When the weather started to change, the Greenbelt organisers were able to fully trust the integration between Crescat and VIKIN. The organisers could make as many changes as they wanted within Crescat, and then sync everything into VIKIN - a process that took just a minute compared to the effort of manually duplicating everything between systems. As changes were happening throughout the day, the integration saved the team countless hours of operational resources.
Not only could the programming changes then get into the hands of attendees as soon as it was published, but the organisers could then jump into the VIKIN platform and use push notifications to send updates about the changes, alongside other safety updates and event communications.
We were delighted with the integration between Crescat and VIKIN, it allowed us to build our entire event schedule and store all our artist info in Crescat, with event updates pushed to our VIKIN-powered app, when we wanted. It was super easy to use and we’re already looking forward to doing it again this year.
The outcome
For the Greenbelt organisers, the Crescat integration turned a difficult situation with severe weather impacting event operations into one that was easier to handle, with the integration taking pressure off of the organising team. The integration demonstrated that it wasn’t just a nice-to-have or a time-saving tool during event preparations, but that it could relieve pressure from the team and make it easier to handle a constantly changing environment.
As information was rapidly updated in the app, despite the notoriously bad phone reception at Greenbelt, attendees could trust the app had the latest data, and use it to plan their weekend and keep partying throughout the storms. Push notifications direct from the organisers kept attendees informed throughout the weekend of inbound rain showers, access guidance, and safety information to help them get around and, on the final day how to leave site safely.
Despite preparing for drought and being met with thunder and lightning, Greenbelt’s final festival at Boughton House was one to remember.
We look forward to supporting Greenbelt’s ‘Between The Fields’ program in 2027 whilst they find a new home, and returning to the fields in 2028, wherever they may be.
