All across New England during the warm weather months David Forgit and his brother Kevin Miller, co-owners of Goodstuff Concessions, sell snacks at fairs and festivals.
Back in the spring, the brothers signed up to sell concessions at a four-day music festival in Bangor, Maine. Organizers said the August event would draw tens-of-thousands of people.
“The attractive thing for us was the summertime on the waterfront in Bangor, Maine, that would have been fantastic,” Forgit said. “If we could have access to enough people to pay the bills, then that would have been great.”
They paid $1,100 to secure a spot at the festival. But then, one week before the event’s opening day, Goodstuff was told the festival was canceled and nothing was mentioned about the money they paid.
“We’re a small company, $1,100 is a lot for us.”
The brothers wanted their deposit back. So they began a campaign of phone calls and emails to the concert organizer. Forgit says they only got busy signals and voicemails. Lawyers they spoke with said it would cost more than $1,100 to sue the company.
Frustrated and almost ready to give up, the brothers contacted Solve It 7. “We had nowhere else to go,” David says. “We were backed into a corner. We were really at a dead end until I saw Solve It 7 on Facebook.”
We reached out to the executive director, and within a week a check was mailed out to Goodstuff.
Robert Harnais is the president-elect of the Massachusetts Bar Association, and he says a clear contract would have made this much easier. The festival paperwork only mentioned two reasons for non-reimbursement, and there was no mention of what would happen if the festival was canceled.
Harnais says you have to be diligent on what you sign. “Read it carefully. Know what you’re signing. Don’t just sign it because it says a contract and you want it to work. Read the contract.”
A different piece of paper had Forgit smiling when he opened his mail to find the much-anticipated check.
“We got the run-around for a good while, and when it finally came through it was a little bit of disbelief. We rushed to put it in the bank right away, you know, before it somehow became untrue.”
Is someone giving you the runaround? We’d like to help. Give us a call at 617-367-7777 or send us an email at solveit7@whdh.com.