When CMA Music Festival — then Fan Fair — moved out of the friendly, familiar confines of the State Fairgrounds in 2001 and set up shop downtown, Nashville’s annual country music extravaganza brought in $15.5 million in direct visitor spending and narrowly failed to sell out its prime-time concerts at LP Field.
Fast forward to 2014, when the four-day festival generated a whopping $39.3 million in direct spending and sold out LP Field concerts nearly a year in advance. There is every reason to believe 2015 will set a new direct spending record and that the 2016 stadium concerts will again sell out long before the lineup is announced.
CMA Music Festival has become the city’s premier tourism event, a critical artist development tool for Nashville’s country music industry and a top-shelf corporate sponsorship opportunity that attracts the likes of AT&T, Chevrolet, Delta Airlines, Budweiser, Papa John’s and many others.
