How Fierté Montréal uses FEST to manage 183 events

When a festival brings together 183 events over 11 days, communication is no longer just a marketing topic. It becomes an operational challenge and a core part of the audience experience.

That is the case for Fierté Montréal, one of the largest LGBTQA+ gatherings in the French-speaking world and a major event for tourism in Montréal.

For the team of Oswaldo Gutiérrez Bayardi, Communications and Marketing Director at Fierté Montréal, the challenge is clear: make a dense program easy to consult, understand and follow throughout the festival.

Fierté Montréal at a glance

• 11 days of festival
• 183 events in the program
• A major event for tourism in Montréal
• A large share of visitors and tourists in the audience

A large-scale communication challenge

Fierté Montréal uses several channels to inform its audience, including its website, newsletter, out-of-home visibility, media campaigns, printed materials and social media.

But with such a dense program, no single channel is enough. Festival-goers need fast access to information, directly on mobile, at the exact moment they need it.

When several events happen in parallel across different locations, clarity becomes essential. FEST acts as a complementary channel: a simple, structured festival app that stays available in the audience’s pocket.

Why the app became central to the audience experience

For the team, the value of FEST starts with accessibility. The app makes it possible to present a large amount of information without making the user experience feel heavy or confusing.

The calendar remains the most important feature for users. It is often the main entry point into the app, before event pages, artists, photos and social links.

For me, the most important feature for the user is the calendar.

A useful channel for real-time communication

One of the most important use cases mentioned by Fierté Montréal is notifications. During the 2024 edition, the team had to cancel one day due to weather conditions. In that kind of situation, speed matters.

With push notifications, the organization was able to inform the public directly and relay the cancellation immediately. For a festival, this is not a nice-to-have feature. It is a real-time communication tool.

Notifications matter. When you need to inform the public quickly, they become essential.

Reducing printed materials through digital tools

By strengthening access to digital tools, Fierté Montréal also reduced the volume of printed programs by half compared with previous years.

This decision responds to a practical need, but also to a more responsible approach. When audiences can easily find the program, locations and key information on mobile, festivals can limit print runs and reduce paper waste.

Several festivals in one app, a structural advantage

For Fierté Montréal, one of FEST’s strongest advantages is the shared model. Rather than funding an isolated app for each festival, the shared approach makes it possible to build a common product that improves over time and benefits multiple organizations.

This matters in a context where organizing festivals is becoming increasingly expensive. Sharing certain resources helps make digital tools stronger, more useful and more sustainable.

For the audience, the benefit is concrete: the more people use FEST across different festivals, the more familiar the experience becomes. The app feels easier from one event to the next.

A long-term collaboration with the FEST team

Oswaldo also highlights the platform’s ease of use and the quality of the support. Since the beginning of the collaboration in 2023, FEST has been seen as a responsive partner, attentive and invested in the project’s success.

Beyond the product itself, this close relationship mattered. For the organization, working with a committed team able to respond quickly and improve alongside them was more valuable than a more impersonal relationship.

Since 2023, we have grown together.

What this case shows for festivals

Fierté Montréal’s feedback shows that a festival app can play several roles at once:

• Simplify access to a complex program
• Offer a clear mobile experience for audiences
• Support real-time communication
• Contribute to a more responsible distribution of information

In a large-scale festival, the challenge is not only to have the right information. It is to make that information easy to consult, easy to update and immediately available when circumstances change.

FEST App is the simplest app for festival organizers. With ultra-fast setup, a free license and partner integrations, it has become a reference in festival mobile apps. In fact, your festival may already be on FEST.

Our team helps festivals communicate better with their audiences, distribute their programming and ticketing, and create more value for their partners.

The information shared in this article comes from an interview with Oswaldo Gutiérrez Bayardi, Communications and Marketing Director at Fierté Montréal, conducted on October 30, 2025.