QR codes for festivals and events

Thirty signs, one look. Every code in your festival colours with your logo in the middle, delivered as a ZIP of print-ready files and a contact sheet your signage printer can work straight from.

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A real example: a stage board

Corran Sounds 2027

Main Stage · set times

A red QR code with a musical note logo in the centre, on a mocked-up festival stage board reading "Corran Sounds 2027, Main Stage, set times" and "Scan for today's running order".

Scan for today's running order

corransounds.com/main-stage

The code on a stage board points at a page on the festival's own site. Set times slip, an act cancels, the page is edited, and the board never needs reprinting.

It is a real code, generated by the same code path that fulfils a paid order and checked to decode before it was published. Point a phone at it and it opens this page.

  • The same logo and red on every sign across the site, from the car park to the bar.
  • Supplied as SVG, so the printer can scale it to an A0 board without it going soft.
  • Still works next year on the signs you kept, because there is no subscription behind it.

Try it — this code really scans

Read this before you order: our codes cannot be edited

Most QR services sold to event organisers make dynamic codes: the code points at their server, which forwards to your page, and you can change the destination from a dashboard. That is useful for a festival, and we do not do it. Our codes are static: the address is written into the pattern itself, nothing sits in between, and nothing can be changed once printed. Here is why we made that choice.

So the rule for a festival is simple. Never point a code at something that will change. Do not point the stage board at this year's PDF running order; point it at yourfestival.com/main-stage and edit that page. Do not point the bar sign at a menu PDF; point it at /bar-menu. Every code links to a short address on your own domain, and every one of those pages can change as often as you like, for as long as you run the festival.

Done that way, a static code is better than a dynamic one for a festival: it costs 30p to £1 once instead of a monthly fee per code, there is no dashboard for a volunteer to lose the login to, and the signs you keep in the container over winter still work next year.

If you need scan counts per sign, or you cannot host short pages on your own site, we are the wrong supplier and you should use a dynamic service. We would rather say that here than refund you after the print run.

The twelve places codes go at a festival

Site map

On the entrance board, the programme and the wristband leaflet. Link to a map page you can update when a stage moves.

Stage boards and set times

One code per stage, each pointing at that stage's page. Changes to the running order never reach the printer.

Bar and food menus

Prices and allergens on a page, not a laminated sheet that is wrong by Saturday.

Welfare and first aid

Where to go, who to call, what to do if someone is unwell. Worth putting on every toilet block.

Lost property

A form people can fill in from the campsite instead of queueing at the info tent.

App download and Wi-Fi

One code that lands on the right store, or a Wi-Fi join code for the crew area.

Feedback surveys

On the exit gates and the bar. The only survey most people will ever fill in is the one they can scan while queueing.

Sponsor activations

A branded code per sponsor stand, in the sponsor's colours if you like, pointing wherever their contract says.

Vendor pitches and traders

Each trader's stall sign links to their own page. Generate the lot from a list in one order.

Campsite and car park

Pitch rules, quiet hours, the shuttle bus timetable. The things people ask stewards about all weekend.

Ticket and wristband registration

A code on the wristband insert that links to registration, cashless top-up or the terms.

Next year's tickets

On the exit signs and the thank-you email. The cheapest early-bird marketing you will do.

The whole site in one order

Paste your destinations one per line on the bulk order page, with a label before each so the files come back named for the sign they belong to:

Main Stage board @ https://corransounds.com/main-stage
Second Stage board @ https://corransounds.com/second-stage
Bar 1 menu @ https://corransounds.com/bar-menu
Welfare tent @ https://corransounds.com/welfare
Lost property @ https://corransounds.com/lost
Exit gate survey @ https://corransounds.com/feedback

Upload the festival logo once, pick the colours once, and every code in the pack comes out matching. You get a ZIP of PNG and SVG files named main-stage-board.svg and so on, a PDF contact sheet showing every code with its label and destination for the production meeting, and a verification report confirming each code was decoded after generation and returned exactly the address you gave.

25 codes for £15, 50 for £25, 100 for £40. Codes you do not use stay on your order for 12 months, so the pack you buy in March covers the signs you forgot in June.

Printing for a field

Outdoor signs are read from further away, in worse light, by people holding a pint. Three things make the difference between a code that scans from the queue and one that does not.

Size. A code is reliably scanned from about ten times its own width away. A 10 cm code works at arm's length; a board read from three metres needs a code at least 30 cm across. Use the SVG and size it in the artwork; do not scale up the PNG.

Contrast. Dark code, pale background, always. A festival palette of teal on orange looks wonderful and will not scan in sunlight. Put the code on a white or near-white panel and let the colour come from the code and the logo.

Quiet zone. Leave clear space around the code, at least the width of four of its small squares. Our files include that margin; tell the printer not to crop it or run artwork over it.

We supply a one-page spec sheet for printers covering all of this. Download it and send it with the artwork.

Before the signs go to print

Every code we send has already been machine-checked, but do this anyway: print the contact sheet, scan every code on it with two different phones, and initial it. Five minutes at the production meeting is cheaper than reprinting a stage board on the Friday. The contact sheet is designed for exactly this.

Questions about a larger order, a purchase order, or an invoice instead of a card payment? Email and say which festival; replies usually within a working day or two.