Utah is losing $196M in Sundance revenue. The state isn’t scared.

After over 40 years, the Sundance Film Festival has had its last hurrah in Park City, Utah, this week. The yearly film festival is arguably the country’s premier event for independent filmmakers, drawing nearly 100 feature films every year that often snag major distribution deals (the SF-set film “The Invite” reportedly just sold for over $10 million). In 2025, the festival attracted 85,472 attendees, an increase of 17% year over year. But come 2027, those attendees – and the $196.1 million they spent – will be heading elsewhere.

To the dismay of many Park City residents, the festival decided last year that it would be packing its bags for Boulder, Colorado. That came after a competitive bidding process, of which a joint bid from Salt Lake City and Park City was a finalist (the other finalist was Cincinnati). The move will mean an end to an endearing tradition that’s become synonymous with the small Utah ski town and a boon for many local businesses.

However, according to the mayor, Park City isn’t as concerned as one might think.

“I wouldn’t say [it’s] crushing. We made our best effort to keep it, but we’ve also had Sundance around in town long enough that we know Sundance’s challenges really well,” Mayor Ryan Dickey told SFGATE.

The incentives to leave

Dickey, himself a longtime attendee of the festival, says the city is not worried about a budget shortfall, or considering cutting any services. Even if Sundance chose to stay in Utah, the state’s proposal was to move the festival’s epicenter to Salt Lake City, using Park City as a satellite site for special events (currently Salt Lake City hosts some screenings, but seldom has premieres). The state proposed a free bus service running every 30 minutes, 18 hours a day to help bridge the gap between the two cities.

“Even in trying to keep Sundance, it wasn’t, ‘Hey, stay here and do the same thing over and over again.’ We proposed a really different festival. Our bid was to keep it in partnership with Salt Lake,” he said.

Utah reportedly offered Sundance over $12 million annually in cash and in-kind contributions to incentivize the festival to stay in the state, plus $10 million in private donations. However, Park City Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Jennifer Wesselhoff told NPR affiliate KDCW that many components of the bid required application through a grant process, compared to Colorado’s guaranteed offerings.

Colorado’s bid included $34 million in incentives over the next 10 years, plus another $34 million in state tax credits. The package included $150,000 in renewable energy credits, $355,000 for free buses and 5,000 e-bike passes, $75,000 for city support, $200,000 for public safety staffing, up to $250,000 in city tax revenue and $500,000 worth of free parking.

It’s a hearty package, but Cris Jones, Boulder’s director of strategic partnerships, feels that the money is only part of the appeal.

“Sundance in many ways – at least in what they’ve communicated to us – has outgrown the Park City footprint a long time ago,” Jones told SFGATE.

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For locals, the traffic is one of the biggest pain points brought on by the festival. Dickey said that 88% of the town’s workforce lives outside city limits. Talk to any local on the bus clad in ski gear, and they’ll tell you that the parade of black SUVs carrying stars isn’t a particularly welcome sight.

“It’s interesting, it’s always been a sort of love/hate with our residents. With Sundance, it is gridlock traffic for more or less four or five days in a small mountain town,” Dickey said.

Lodging is often one of the biggest gripes for attendees. Despite Boulder having a population over 10 times the size of Park City (108,000 compared to 8,900), Park City actually has a larger amount of hotel rooms than Boulder (4,000 compared to 2,900). The major difference is the surrounding areas – within 40 miles, Boulder has 74,000 rooms compared to 20,000 in Salt Lake City. Jones also said the city is exploring ways to allow more local homeowners to offer short-term rentals. According to data from AirDNA, Park City saw 33,594 nights’ worth of booking in 2025, with an average rate of $677 per property. With such a high cost, it’s not uncommon for attendees to pack multiple people into a bedroom (this reporter has stayed both on a living room floor and in bunk beds).

“If you think about who is attending film festivals, young filmmakers, they just couldn’t afford to come stay in Park City,” Dickey said.

Still a ski town

For many, Park City is synonymous with the festival, but its year-round identity has more to do with skiing. The ski industry contributed $2.5 billion to Utah’s economy during the 2024-2025 season, including $1.32 billion from Summit County, where Park City is located. And the region continues investing in attracting more skiers, with major resort companies Vail Resorts and Alterra Mountain Company (which own Park City Mountain and nearby Deer Valley Resort respectively) undergoing major renovation projects: Deer Valley is unveiling 80 new runs and Park City is adding a new lift.

However, the city is currently going through a snow drought. As of Dec. 21, only 4% of Park City Mountain’s terrain was open to skiers. It’s a stark contrast to 2024, which in February had its snowiest month ever. Dickey expressed that he believes that a successful ski season can fill the gap left by the festival’s departure.

“We’re not sure it’s going to have any economic impact at all,” Dickey said. “Sundance has a big economic impact, but we actually have this history from COVID of two different years where we had no Sundance Film Festival. And what we had was two extra weekends that were just monster ski weekends, and we expect to have that again.”

If you consider ski season to be seven months long, 10 days of ski revenue for the county equates to about $87 million – a giant sum, but well short of Sundance’s $196 million impact.

Even so, local bar and restaurant O’Shucks White House also concurred with Dickey’s sentiments, despite the major influx of Sundance business. On the first weekend of the festival, the bar was standing room only at lunchtime. The festival accounts for the 10 busiest days of the year, according to manager Manny Luna, resulting in nearly four times as much business. He said many of his peers also see increases of 200-300%, and vendors struggle to keep up with supply.

“It’s hectic, it’s crazy, you’re running like a chicken with your head cut off, because there’s no way you could predict how much sales you have,” Luna said.

Even so, he didn’t seem all too concerned about the void the festival will leave. He expects more locals to come through the doors this time next year, since many leave town during the fest, and the additional skiers will help soften the revenue gap.

“The only thing that’s scary is to not have snow. Because if we don’t have snow, we’re not going to have people coming, that’s the scary part,” Luna said.

The cultural void

Beyond the economic impact, the cultural void left by the festival will be felt throughout the city. The Egyptian Theatre on Main Street, whose history dates back to the early 1900s, was the original home of the film festival. It operates as a venue for live music, theater and comedy through most of the year, but its sparkling marquee has become one of the images most associated with Sundance. The theater boasts the only remaining work in town by street artist Banksy, a little rat from 2010, when “Exit Through the Gift Shop” premiered at the fest. And it has seen its fair share of celebrities over the years.

“In terms of star power, our theater is a magnet for that,” owner Randy Barton said. “One day there was a panel about the power of story. It featured Robert Redford to my right, Bill Gates is standing 5 feet away, and here comes Bill and Hillary Clinton. So it was a pretty good little moment in the small town lobby of a theater.”

But he insists that jobs won’t be going away as a result of the festival leaving, and that there will be some bright sides for locals and skiers.

“I know room rates won’t be as high, and it’ll be easier to get into restaurants for locals and others visiting,” Barton says. “It was a 10-day period out of a 365-day calendar – it’s not like this is our deal and we rely on it to keep us afloat.”

For longtime attendees of the festival, a couple of extra ski weekends is no substitute for the wealth of world-class cinema. Sean Baker of Salt Lake City has attended the festival for 30 years, volunteering for about 20, and has seen around 850 films by his account. This year, his favorite so far has been “See You When I See You” from director Jay Duplass (“The Puffy Chair,” “Jeff, Who Lives at Home”), and one of the most memorable experiences was the 2001 screening of Christopher Nolan’s “Memento.”

“[I was just] thinking, ‘Oh, he’s going to go somewhere.’ It’s so much fun to watch all these budding directors start somewhere so small, and then go on to be these powerful juggernauts in the film industry,” he said.

Baker was in disbelief when he heard the news of the departure, since Sundance has renewed the contract many times over the years despite bids from other cities. Even so, he plans to follow the festival to Boulder next year, but it won’t be the same to not have the festival in his backyard.

“It’s just so many memories, it’s just crazy. To see it leave, it’s kind of heartbreaking,” he said.

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This article originally published at Utah is losing $196M in Sundance revenue. The state isn’t scared..