A food vendor who worked at Olivia Rodrigo’s inaugural Daisy Chain Fields festival has penned an open letter to the singer, claiming that there were unpaid fees and poor management.
Inspired by the Lilith Fair music festivals of the ’90s, the single-day event took place at the end of August at Great Park in Irvine, California – hosting performances from from Chappell Roan, Bikini Kill, Doechii, Garbage and more, and raising money for charities and community-focused organisations.
Before the day kicked off, Rodrigo revealed that the event would be donating $10 million to its non-profit partners, and during the festival, there was even more money raised for non-profit organisations dedicated to supporting and advocating for women and girls. These included Baby2Baby, Black Mamas Matter Alliance, Center For Reproductive Rights, FreeFrom, Johns Hopkins Center For Indigenous Health, National Women’s Law Center and Planned Parenthood, and you can find out more about the work of the organisations here.
Now, following the one-day event wrapping up earlier this summer, one of the food vendors who worked at the festival has penned an open letter to Rodrigo, claiming that they faced poor management and have been left with unpaid fees.
Taking to Instagram, a woman named Mary Chacon who owns Ugly Oats Kitchen said that she reached out to Rodrigo and her team “two days after” the festival as they “haven’t yet been paid out for our sales (in violation of our contact)”.
She also shared that while she has been “hesitant to share” the issues publicly out of it potentially damaging the reputation of her company, she was now doing so in the hopes of getting a response.
In her open letter, she began by thanking the singer for “organising such a safe and historic event”, and said that it was a “privilege” to be involved – especially as Rodrigo’s music “has gotten me through some of my hardest days”.
“I love everything that you stand for and the risks you take to fight for women everywhere,” she added, before saying that she believes some of the “$20 million raised for women” on the day felt like it was “done at the expense of some of the women vendors”.
In her letter, Chacon recalled how she was asked to take part in the event and told that they “would be fined if we ran out of food”, so made “thousands of cookies and shut down [their] bakery” to do so.
From there, she claimed, the company was told that they would have to pay “about $1,400 in fees” and “forfeiting 35 per cent of our sales” to the festival – which cost them “several thousand dollars”.
Examples of poor management Chacon detailed included being told about big purchases they had to make at the “last minute” for the appearance at the festival to go ahead, as well as not receiving “setup information until a few hours before we were supposed to arrive”; meaning that they struggled to get on-site.
At the event, the letter claimed, they “did not see a lot customers” and ended up hearing from some concertgoers that they were unaware that there was food available in that section of the festival site.
“It appears that DLS booked too many dessert vendors and not enough meal vendors, setting vendors and attendees up for a difficult day,” Chacon went on, also adding that her staff were not told about any areas where they could get food and drinks, and the tough conditions led to someone on her team getting “heat exhaustion and was unable to find real food after she started vomiting”.
“It was the most miserable day my staff and I have experienced as part of Ugly Oats. Unfortunately, it will take our business months to recoup the losses from this single event,” her letter continued, adding that while she still sees it as a “privilege to be invited”, she hopes to raise awareness for the “experience of the women entrepreneurs on the ground” in time for a potential 2027 edition.
NME has reached out to a spokesperson for Daisy Chain Fields and for Olivia Rodrigo for comment about the claims made by Chacon.
During Olivia Rodrigo’s headline set at the festival, she was joined by Stevie Nicks, Alanis Morissette and Sarah McLachlan, performing ‘Landslide’, ‘Ironic’, ‘Building A Mystery’ and ‘Angel’.
After it was confirmed that it had raised $10million for 10 non-profit partners, Melinda French Gates matched its original total, bringing the total amount of money made from the event to $20million.
NME gave the festival a four-and-a-half star review, celebrating it as “a beautiful, empowering triumph”.
Since the festival wrapped up, Rodrigo has kicked off her huge ‘Unraveled’ world tour in Connecticut – which was filled with live renditions of songs from her third album, ‘You Seem Pretty Sad For A Girl So In Love’.
