Mullet Festival's return pushed back one year to October 2025

NICEVILLE — Residents anticipating the long-awaited return of the Mullet Festival will need to exercise patience for at least one more year, as organizers have decided to postpone the event until 2025.

During the Niceville City Council meeting Tuesday, Mark Wagner of White Hat Productions and attorney Shiraz Hosein, who represents the group, informed the council that the time to bring big-name artists to the festival has passed, forcing the group to postpone the event.

"We're ready to go forward with announcing the event for 2025 because we missed out on the opportunity to get the right artists, but we're prepared to go forward with the event," Hosein said.

Wagner echoed Hosein's comments, adding that he intends to bring a "top 10 ride company" to fill in the midway and said that plans are ongoing to secure headline acts on the same level as Miranda Lambert or Jelly Roll.

"There is no way we could do it for 2024 and do it right," Wagner said. "We've decided to push it back until 2025."

"It's wise," Councilman Sal Nodjomian said.

Regarding the Mullet Festival grounds and White Hat Productions' ability to obtain a permit for the event, City Manager David Deitch told White Hat Productions that discussions are ongoing with the U.S. Air Force, which owns the grounds and leases the land to the city, about securing the rights to host the festival again.

"Nothing in the Department of Defense moves on a fast track," Deitch said.

Deitch said the Air Force has sent the city directions on how to amend the request to lease the grounds, but Deitch anticipates any issue will be resolved before October 2025.

This article originally appeared on Northwest Florida Daily News: Mullet Festival postponed to 2025, citing more time to sign artists