Three Irish music festivals seek €580,000 compensation after Tickets.ie collapse

The three festivals — Leitrim’s Cowboys and Heroes Festival, Donegal’s Rory Gallagher Festival and Meath’s Rockathon — were among the largest event organisers tied to the ticketing agent. File picture

Three independent music festivals have joined forces to seek compensation for approximately €580,000 in losses arising from the the closure of Tickets.ie.

Leitrim’s Cowboys and Heroes country music festival, Donegal’s Rory Gallagher International Festival, and Rockathon in Meath were among some of the biggest operators tied to the ticketing agent.

Each scheduled their festival from late May to early June, but have been unable to generate an invoice from ticket sales on the now defunct Tickets.ie. 

The company announced the cessation of its operations and plans to enter liquidation on Wednesday.

“We're three independent festivals, we're all set up in 2014, we've gone through our own rollercoaster,” said Cowboy and Heroes director Simon Power.

“All three were viable and successful festivals, and it's going to be devastating.” 

The platform was majority-owned by German entertainment company DEAG and traded as Oshi Software Ltd. 

Mr Power said the agent's unannounced closure days after the conclusion of his festival felt like “an incredibly cynical design". 

“Ireland's a very last-minute kind of country when it comes to ticket sales… If three or four weeks ago they said to me ‘things are not looking good for ourselves’… I could just have flicked a switch and sold locally.

“It would have probably sold €65,000 worth of tickets and then it would have been manageable.” 

A representative for the Rockathon Festival, who did not want to be named for personal reasons, said he was blindsided by Tickets.ie’s unannounced decision to shutter operations and found it “very distressing."

He stressed his hopes for the company’s liquidator to be sympathetic to the affected festivals.

Tickets.ie was founded in 2004 by John O’Neill. 

DEAG took a 74% stake in the company in 2022. In its final company filings, also in 2022, Oshi Software Ltd posted a loss of €268,000.

Mr O’Neill stepped down as a director in March 2025.