T in the Park £15m strikes right chord for economy

Scotland’s biggest music festival is now worth more than £15 million for the nation’s economy, organisers have revealed.

T-time fun as music fans lap up the atmosphere at Balado. Picture: Lisa Ferguson

The value of T in the Park has shot up by more than 60 per cent in just three years, according to latest research commissioned by the event, which has been forced to move to a new site from next year.

Around a fifth of the audience for the festival, launched 20 years ago by promoters DF Concerts, travels from outwith Scotland.

The value of the event has risen from £7.3m in 2005 to £9.6m in 2011 and £15.4m this year, its last time being staged at Balado, Kinross-shire.

It emerged shortly before this year’s event that the festival would relocate 18 miles away to Strathallan Castle, in Perthshire. Organisers have been forced to secure formal planning permission after discovering that ospreys were nesting in the area.