THE organisers of Porlock's Samphire Festival said they are 'heartbroken' they can no longer run the festival.

The festival had taken place over the last two summers, with 1,000 people descending on the Porlock Hill site for last year's event.

The brainchild of couple Flora Blathwayt and Josh Beauchamp, Samphire got off to a fantastic start picking up multiple awards including Best Small Festival, Best PR campaign of the year and the ID&C Grassroots Festival Award over the last two years.

Samphire rallied the whole community with the parish ‘fully behind’ the festival because of the enormous positive effect it brought to the area.

However their success on the field wasn’t echoed financially, which the duo say was largely down to 'costly health and safety licence stipulations' which have ultimately made running the festival 'unsustainable and too risky' without secure financial backing.

Flora and Josh released a joint statement which reads: "The last two and a half years working on Samphire have genuinely been the most memorable years of our lives.

"Josh and I embarked on this journey together with literally zilch festival/event experience and to have got through two fabulous years safely and with brilliant critical acclaim is truly way beyond what we ever anticipated.

"People told us we were too ‘young and inexperienced’ but we were determined we could make it work."

Flora and Josh said there had been a lot of ups and downs including two court hearings, breaking crowdfunder records and winning awards.

"We’ve always been extremely open about our rollercoaster journey so in the true spirit of Samphire transparency we’re going to do the same now.

"We cannot put on another Samphire this year. We would love nothing more than this not to be the case but right now we just aren’t able. Most of you know Josh and I are in relationship and Samphire is basically like our baby. To be in a position where we have no option but to let go of this despite two brilliant years is really hard. "

The couple said they have invested a substantial amount of money and the two could not keep borrowing money for the amount of time needed to turn Samphire into an event which covers its costs.

Flora and Josh said: "We’re well aware the first few years are expected to be very tough and we definitely weren’t expecting it to be any sort of cash cow but we’ve been hit pretty hard by health and safety, legal costs and licence stipulations that have made running our festival on our beautiful Exmoor site totally unsustainable.

"There have been so many tears at the prospect of letting Samphire go and although we are not banking on it, we are still hoping that an investor will provide the financial backing to put on the festival again.

"We know if we had a few years under our belt we would take Samphire high into the clouds but we can’t get to that place on our own right now.

"We will never ever forget all the wonderful people who helped us and everyone who came to make the events so special. Thank you to all of you."

If anyone wants to chat to the organisers about Samphire’s future or potentially use the site email info@samphirefestival.com