As the crowds head to Worthy Farm, Somerset for the first Glastonbury festival for three years, over 200,00  people will be revelling in the sheer joy of live entertainment, surrounded by fields and fellow fans. The Glastonbury experience is like no other – and it has become the defining music festival in the UK, and possibly the world.

The heights of devotion, entertainment and interaction that Glastonbury achieves would be the envy of many a brand. So, what can brands learn from this unique festival experience?

Glastonbury is disruptive, creative and experimental. What Michael Eavis – and now his daughter, Emily Eavis has enabled  is an ecosystem in which  creative people can try things out. And this is a great strength of experiences. They are safe spaces to play in. Brands can co-create, experiment and trial in ways that are more temporary.

So, while the aim of some brand experiences is to linger, especially brand destinations, pop-ups offer moments where brands can explore and push the boundaries. Pop-ups are the physical version of Instagram Stories allowing you to post something that then disappears.

Fashion brands are often good at playing with these temporary type approaches. Diesel did it successfully with its ‘go with the flaw’ campaign that saw it producing items with Diesel deliberately misspelt, selling them in its own knockoff shop to tie in with New York Fashion Week. It was clever and disruptive. Because fashion brands have such a high frequency and calendars to market and launch around, they are forced to be quite provocative and take the guardrails off their brand guidelines when it comes to experiences.

The creative firepower of experimentation

There is an interesting balance to be struck for businesses between allowing creativity to flourish and respecting brand guidelines. The very notion of a brand is often something fixed, clearly identifiable and consistent. So, of course, brands love to establish detailed guidelines and ensure constancy, and that’s entirely understandable – for brand investment, protection and recognition. But does enough space remain to be experimental and creative? Has the Glastonbury brand got an experience guideline? I doubt it. What it has, is the imagination of the founders, working with different people and following their hearts on what feels right. In the recent BBC documentary Glastonbury Festival: 50 Years and Counting Michael Eavis says there are things that he doesn’t really like but that he lets happen because he doesn’t act as a judge on what’s right – the audience are the judges.

While inevitably brand guidelines must exist, it’s important for companies to include room for manoeuvre – to allow for playfulness and for their audiences to push and poke and expand the brand. This is easier for some than others – the freedom of expression of fashion brands allows people to co-create more readily, whereas for a car brand ultra-personalisation is reserved for the elite, with most offering a more limited element of real creative personalisation. But as designers start to change their outlook on what their brand DNA really is, as production methods evolve to allow more personalisation within a framework, as brand guidelines become more experience-led rather than two dimensional – where can brands push the envelope? The answer lies in experiences.

Temporary experiences allow you to test, learn, and experiment – and if things are wrong, it’s okay. Brands may not be able to be as free-spirited as Glastonbury but they can be bolder and braver creatively and that takes real insight and transparency.

Michael Eavis was inspired by the Bath Blues Festival, he was a dairy farmer but he was open-minded and wanted to do something different and he was willing to collaborate to make things happen. The first Glastonbury festival wasn’t successful; he tried something, it didn’t work and then he did it again and brought in more people and influences and pushed the boundaries and co-created and then it all just clicked.

With creativity you have to let it flourish and take the wrong turns sometimes, it’s not logical. But you can guide it and learn. There is a path and process and way to inflame it. Glastonbury has evolved – and the bands that perform often reinvent a new version of who they are within the prism of Glastonbury. It allows them to reimagine themselves. Eavis has been willing to shift the acts and embrace different types of music. He allowed the festival to reinvent itself around the types of talent appearing and be more diverse. To allow yourself to be creatively led by the true audience and not a caricature target persona, allows you to reach & engage new audiences who are part of your brand’s story and even its culture.