Maneskin won the Eurovision Song Contest 2021, bringing back to Italy a victory that had been missing for 31 years. A historic success for our country thanks to the Roman rock group that conquered Sanremo in March with its performance of "Shut up and Good" and that with the performance at the final in Rotterdam managed to convince the jury and the public. The news went around the world and, leaving out the as unfounded as defamatory allegations against the singer of the band, brought Italian music back to the top of the world.
The Maneskin victory also brings with it another important result: in 2022 Italy will organize the festival of international music that every year, for the final, nails in front of the TV an average of 200 million viewers. A live event of global reach that will give prestige to the country and to organize which you will have to start well in advance.
EUROVISION: HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO ORGANIZE IT?
But how much does it cost to organize Eurovision? For two days this question has been circulating far and wide. And then we can answer that there is no fixed figure, but to understand what awaits us next year we can make two comparisons: one with the Festival of Sanremo, the other with the costs that other states have borne in the last few years.
Let's start with Sanremo 2021. Between conductors, guests, scenography, annual convention to be paid to the Municipality of Sanremo and so on, the total cost of Sanremo 2021 was equal to 17,4 million euro. A high figure, but decidedly well spent given that in recent years the direct and indirect revenues produced by the festival have always exceeded the costs. This year, for example, alone 38 million euros came from advertising, 1 million more than in 2020. A result that arrived despite the Covid-19 emergency putting a strain on the organization and made it possible thanks to a traditionally very high audience: according to the elaboration of Studio Frasi on Auditel data, the average audience stood at 8.433.199 with a share of 47,72 percent.
Let's move on instead to the latest editions of Eurovision. To organize the 2021 edition in Rotterdam, the Netherlands had budgeted an expenditure of 26,5 million euros. To this figure, however, we must add costs of 6,7 million deriving from the cancellation of the Eurovision Song Contest 2020, skipped due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In the last ten years, it was there that spent the highest amount'Azerbaijan, which in 2012 paid out 51 million euros for the festival, 9 million for collateral events and even 100 million for the construction of the Baku Crystal Hall. Much cheaper instead the Eurovision organized the following year by Swedencost a total of 15 million euros. By averaging the various editions, we can say that the overall costs travel on average around 20-25 million euros.
AMAZING REVENUES
As mentioned, Rai managed to collect 38 million euros of advertising, thanks to an audience of 8,4 million viewers. The final night of Eurovision in recent years has been seen by 200 million people, about 25 times more. The potential revenues deriving from advertising revenues are therefore enormous. And to these we must add the turnover from tickets, the repercussions in terms of tourism and image for the organizing city and for the whole country. If organized well, therefore, the profits could be very large.
EUROVISION 2022: 4 ITALIAN CITIES IN THE RACE
Faced with figures of this magnitude, it is easy to understand how every city is willing to make false papers to win the event. The victory of the Maneskin means that our country has the burden of hosting Eurovision in 2022 and 48 hours from the end of the festival the "totocittà" has already started.
To date, Italy has hosted two editions of Eurovision, the '65 one organized in Naples and the '91 one held in Rome.
There seem to be 4 cities in pole position to organize the next edition: Milan, Rome, Turin and Bologna.
In fact, we remind you that the connections that the city is able to guarantee will weigh on the choice, the accommodation capacity of the place that will be called upon to host thousands of tourists, but also the presence of a structure large enough (at least 10 seats) to accommodate delegations and spectators . The battle between cities has already started, but for the moment we are all still "Shut Up and Good" for a while.
