A woman whose garden fence was sprayed with graffiti after a huge vegan festival has been offered free tickets to the event next year.
Lenka Loubser’s garden fence in Buckingham Road, Bicester, was tagged in pink graffiti with the words ‘go vegan’.
The graffiti appeared on Mrs Loubser’s garden fence during the Vegan Campout Festival, held in late July, but she has since been contacted by the production manager of the festival, Paul O’Neill, with an apology.
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Mrs Loubser said: “Mr O’Neill called me yesterday, asking if he could replace the fence for me, but I told him it was fine, and the council had already cleaned it.
“He was very apologetic, and offered me and my family a VIP ticket, so I accepted. It would be interesting to see what the festival is all about.
“He also said he wants to apologise to me and my family in person.
“I suggested to him that if he wants to advertise the festival next year, he could approach the houses on Buckingham Road and see if they will put up posters.”
Speaking on the misconduct of some of the festival goers, Mr O’Neill said: “I had a long chat with Mrs Loubser and offered her the free VIP tickets just to say sorry.
“I had to explain that we can’t be responsible for every single person that comes to the festival, and this is something we don’t encourage. It’s not good for the festival if the community of a town don’t like it.”
Mr O’Neill, who is a self-confessed cheese addict, said: “The festival was very successful. We sold 3,500 more tickets than the year before. We sold 12,000 tickets.
“It ran well too, there were some contractors who let us down, so we had to make up time and people to get through the festival, but the area at Bicester Heritage was great.
“I think we sold more tickets because we’ve moved closer to London with this location. It really helps.
“We’re very happy to be using the location again next year, and we’ll be having a debrief with Bicester Heritage soon to discuss the pros and cons of this year. The site has never been used for a camping festival before.”
Mr O’Neill thinks Vegan Campout Festival definitely helps to promote the cause of veganism, detailing that the festival has three main tents, comedy, music and education, and that education is the most popular stage.
He said: “The vegan movement is akin to the suffragette movement. People don’t get it now, but one day people will all understand the need for animal rights.
"Pretty much the whole world will be vegan in our kids' lifetime.”
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This story was written by Matthew Norman, he joined the team in 2022 as a Facebook community reporter.
Matthew covers Bicester and focuses on finding stories from diverse communities.
Get in touch with him by emailing: Matthew.norman@newsquest.co.uk
Follow him on Twitter: @OxMailMattN1
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