With a mess of promotional occasions nearly as lengthy and various as its artist lineup, Coachella, one of many greatest music festivals on the earth, is now an amusement park for influencers and a gold mine for manufacturers.
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, or just Coachella, has grow to be the tone-setter for the U.S. competition circuit.
Tickets for this version — now in its second weekend with pop stars Sabrina Carpenter, Justin Bieber and reggaeton artist Karol G on the high of the invoice — bought out final yr inside 4 days of occurring sale.
With that, organizers had been anticipating round 250,000 individuals to come back over two weekends on the Empire Polo Club in Indio, the place dozens of particular occasions with style, magnificence, beverage, and life-style manufacturers had been unfold out among the many competition’s 9 phases.
“I love how big it’s gotten. I love how more people are open to it,” 24-year-old Luz Maura informed AFP at an e.l.f. Beauty station.
The pastel-colored area supplied lip glosses as souvenirs, slushies to ease the excessive desert temperatures, make-up artists to the touch up glittery competition appears, and hosted a number of selfie corners.
The “e.l.f.scape to Balm Desert” marketing campaign drew a “six-figure audience,” stated Patrick O’Keefe, the corporate’s vice chairman of built-in advertising and marketing, to AFP.
Promoting a moisturizing lip balm was not nearly seizing on the arid, dry desert’s local weather — it was additionally backed by gross sales knowledge.
“We know that 92 percent of daily makeup users incorporate lip products into their routines,” he added.
Its donut-shaped chairs and branded mirrors additionally function irresistible selfie backdrops that in flip promote the model.
At the competition that is generally dubbed the “influencer olympics,” Pinterest selected to swim in opposition to the tide with a “phone-free” set up.
Amid the talk over digital fatigue, “we made a willing decision to sacrifice that sort of immediate coverage in order to tell a story about what we believe in and who we are, and our hope is that, you know, long term that sinks in,” Sarah Pollack, the corporate’s vice chairman and international head of shopper advertising and marketing, informed AFP.
With their telephones locked away in a pouch, guests to the Pinterest area had to withstand the urge to feed their social networks with pictures of the colourful bar for designing customized equipment or the make-up room.
For California resident Liz Mendoza, the “analog experience” was “a lot of fun.”
“Especially in an environment like this where social media is such a big thing and you want to take pictures and post as much as you can, I think it’s super nice to have a few minutes off of your phone and just be in the moment,” Mendoza added.
Pollack maintained that Coachella, the place they’re collaborating for a 3rd yr, “is a great place for us to connect with Gen Z, and Gen Z is our fastest growing demographic.”
She famous that fifty p.c of Pinterest’s viewers was Gen Z.
In the Coachella Valley, the place temperatures can climb previous 86F (30C) this time of yr, so-called “brand activations” additionally function oases of shade and, in some circumstances, air-con.
And the crowds these facilities entice are a gold mine for manufacturers.
Absolut, a vodka model, units up Absolut Heat Haus annually. The area appears like a nightclub, with bars and a DJ answerable for the music — a job that final yr fell to Paris Hilton.
“Coachella is a standout moment for Absolut because it’s more than a music festival — it’s a high-energy social occasion and a cultural destination,” stated the corporate’s model director, Bethan Hamilton.
Flor Ruiz, who was born the identical yr that Coachella started — 1999 — stated the competition’s extracurriculars are key to the expertise.
“For me, there’s no such thing as Coachella without this,” she stated, as she left one of many promo occasions. “It’s not just about the music. For that, we’d just go to a concert.”
© 2026 AFP