Like thousands of others, I happily wandered the packed streets of Lennox a couple of Saturdays back, during the Love Lennox festival.
Our family marvelled at Brazilian drummers, indulged in sweet treats, and admired vintage cars, while bumping into friends and acquaintances.
But sitting enjoying a band, we were stunned to discover the giant sponsor’s logo on the main stage was the controversial global corporation, Airbnb.
And it was emblazoned on the high-vis vests of festival helpers. Even a Ballina Shire councillor was wearing one.
I understand the challenges of finding sponsors. I also understand many people decide to use Airbnb.
This column is not about those private decisions. It’s about a very public festival sponsorship. In the midst of a housing crisis forcing millions of people into insecure and unaffordable rentals, does Lennox Head really want to get into bed with Airbnb?
Ballina Council’s housing strategy makes the problematic nature of this deal crystal clear.
‘Online holiday rental platforms’ are one of the factors ‘impacting the local long-term rental supply.’ A key aim of that housing strategy is increasing ‘available permanent rental stock through limits on non-hosted short-term rental accommodation.’
Global controversy
From Barcelona to New York, local, state and national governments are responding to community concerns, and cracking down on Airbnb and other platforms which help drive housing availability down, and prices up.
Last month, the Spanish government reportedly ordered Airbnb to remove over 65,000 rental properties from its platform, for alleged violations of local rules. Barcelona – which has led global responses to Airbnb – recently announced plans to ban all short-term holiday rental licences by 2028. Other places imposing bans, restrictions, or new taxes, include Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris, Melbourne, and Byron.
When listing the many risks to its business, Airbnb’s 2024 annual report revealed the ‘City of New York has effectively banned short-term rentals’ with restrictions being considered across that state. Airbnb recently settled tax disputes with the Italian government, paying out almost A$1 billion, and with Ireland, paying almost $250 million.
For the record, Airbnb’s current worth is around $125 billion.
Its 2024 revenue was $17 billion, and it spent $3.3 billion on sales and marketing, almost twice as much as on administration.
Money talks
In light of that global marketing budget, Airbnb purchased their brand marketing at Love Lennox for a pittance, but it was money well spent.
When community concerns about holiday rentals inevitably spill into council debates about new rules, global Airbnb has bought itself a lot of local goodwill.
Money talks. Sponsorship matters. We don’t tend to bite the hand that feeds us.
Corporations with a lot at stake controversially use marketing and sponsorship to undermine collective attempts to improve the lives of people and the planet.
Take the climate crisis as an example. Tim Winton has urged arts festivals to stop taking sponsorship from fossil fuel giants keen to greenwash their reputations. Other high-profile Australians have boycotted the prestigious Walkley journalism awards. Why? Because of sponsorship deals with oil companies.
Few now dispute the science showing the burning of fossil fuels helps drive climate change. Similarly, there’s now evidence, not just anecdote, that platforms like Airbnb are one of the drivers of the housing crisis, so acute in our Northern Rivers region.
In 2023 one of Australia’s most reputable groups of housing academics delivered a report on short-term rentals in Byron, for the NSW Independent Planning Commission (IPC).
‘There is a growing empirical, as distinct from anecdotal literature, on the impact of short-term rental accommodation on housing rents,’ it stated. ‘Cities where a relationship between a loss of rental stock and increases in rents has been empirically established include Barcelona, Thessalanki, Athens, Berlin, and London.’
The report estimated one in four Byron houses were listed on a platform, with around 1,600 Airbnb hosts, and over 1,300 houses that could have been available for long-term rentals. The affordability crisis, it outlined, meant essential workers like those in hospitality and retail, and professionals such as teachers, police officers and nurses, will be ‘increasingly unable to live and work’ here.
I’m sure those who negotiated the festival sponsorship, on both sides, are hardworking people of goodwill. This column is written with a deep sense of respect to those who made Love Lennox such a success. But the festival website states that sponsors are ‘limited to businesses with a positive local impact’. Let’s hope that limitation gets a little more consideration in the future.
♦ Dr Ray Moynihan works as a researcher at the University of Sydney and has an honorary position at Bond University.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
