Laneway festival illness reports: Sheppards NZ says its food is not to blame

Sheppards NZ insists it is not responsible for reports of illness after Auckland's Laneway festival. Photo / Sheppards NZ

A Laneway food truck says it is “very confident” it is not responsible for people falling ill at the music festival after earlier urging diners to come forward if they had any symptoms.

Several festivalgoers complained on social media that they had become sick after dining at Sheppards NZ during Thursday’s event at Auckland’s Western Springs.

Those reports prompted the Tex-Mex food truck on Saturday to urge diners to come forward with any further information.

On Sunday, Sheppards NZ’s operators told the Herald: “The only messages we have received have been ones of support and people saying how much they enjoyed our food and did not get sick”.

“From what we have heard, and from our own internal review of our systems and processes, we are very confident our food was not responsible.”

It said it has received emails from punters who hadn’t eaten anything at the festival but had similar symptoms to those who had become ill.

One female attendee, whose comments were shared with the Herald by the food truck, told Sheppards NZ she’d become sick despite only consuming water at the event’s designated water stations.

“It will be interesting who else got sick without eating any of our food”, Sheppards NZ said, before adding that “it probably isn’t our place to speculate” on the cause of any illness.

One woman earlier said on social media she had been unable to “do anything” the day after Thursday’s festival and that she was experiencing “the worst” diarrhoea, with several other users sharing their own experiences of illness in the comments to her post.

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“I’ve had the worst cramping all day after eating their food”, someone wrote, while a third user also said she had been “suffering”.

Sheppards NZ deleted its social media posts about Laneway after the complaints.

“We have served hundreds of customers around the country this summer without any issues, so this has been deeply distressing for a small business”, the company told the Herald.

Established by Hamish Pinkham, one of the founders of major New Years festival Rhythm and Vines, the catering truck regularly feeds festivalgoers at events around the country, including yesterday’s Worship at the Auckland Domain.

It will be going ahead with the remainder of its scheduled appearances around the country, the company said.

“We are looking forward to the remaining summer calendar of festivals and events and hope anyone that was affected is on the mend.”