The festival experience.

The weather may have been changeable this summer, but UK consumers' - and thus marketers' - love affair with outdoor music events shows no sign of flagging, writes Nicola Clark.

While consumers have shown their willingness to trade down, cut back and embrace a more frugal lifestyle following the recession, the position of music festivals at the heart of the UK summer appears to have been unaffected.

Indeed, the enthusiasm shown for outdoor music events - from advertisers as well as festival-goers and performers, seems to be growing. All the tickets for this year's V Festival were snapped up less than two hours after they were placed on sale.

It was a similar story for Glastonbury: on-line forums were awash with desperate pleas from disappointed music fans after tickets sold out in just 15 hours. This was despite a pounds 10 increase in the price, with full weekend tickets costing pounds 185.

Marketing activity continued to centre predominantly on alcohol brands, which use festivals to drive both product awareness and significant volume sales. However, advertisers from sectors as diverse as charities and self-tanning were also present. High-end brands such as MAC and St Tropez made their mark this summer, reflecting the increasingly upmarket audience of 'glamping' festival-goers.

Suffice to say, then, that …