Britain’s Grassroots Venues Slip Deeper Into Loss as Noise Complaints and Gentrification Take Hold

More than half of Britain’s grassroots music venues are losing money. New figures shared at The Great Escape conference in Brighton show 53.8% of the country’s small spaces operated at a loss in 2025, up sharply from 44% the year before. Employment in the sector fell from 30,885 people to 24,242 over the same period.

A panel on the festival’s opening day zeroed in on the forces accelerating that decline. Megan Thompson of Brighton venue Joy, Annie Dorrett of The Prince Albert and band Clt Dry, and Sally Oakenfold of The Hope and Ruin spoke alongside moderator Adam Joolia from AudioActive. All three women help run the city’s Homegrown festival, a collaborative effort that exists in direct tension with the competitive reality of running a venue.

Thompson described small venues as “the unsung heroes of A&R,” pointing to Brighton band Lambrini Girls, whose first headline show happened in her room. “Bands will always remember where they put on their first gig,” she said. The discussion framed noise complaints as a near-fatal blow for spaces already squeezed by gentrification and scant government support since the pandemic.

The panel renewed a push for the Music Venue Trust’s proposed compulsory levy on arenas and stadiums. Only 8.8% of those large-capacity sites have signed on. Oakenfold recalled booking CMAT on a quiet Sunday that didn’t sell out, only to watch the artist later fill the 5,000-capacity Brighton Centre. That money, she argued, needs a route back to the rooms that do the early work.