Conwy's businesses have banded together to ensure the Pirate festival continues in the town.

Following the revelation that Conwy Pirate Weekend organisers HTC Events had successfully negotiated for a move to Rhos-on-Sea on June 16 and 17, a rival, event rebranded The Original Conwy Pirate Festival will take place on the same weekend.

Spearheaded by the Liverpool Pirate Brethren, Conwy re-enactor Adam 'Tiny" Kitson and Derek Blamire - one of the founders of the event in 2012 and owner of Conwy train station carpark - the event has snowballed into a fully fledged festival following support from businesses including the Bank of Conwy and pirate HQ The Blue Bell.

Mr Blamire said: "A lot of people were really disappointed that the festival was leaving, and we wanted to make sure people who were booked into hotels for the festival had something to do in the town when they arrived.

"Even though it was dropped on us in a big hurry, we thought we should get something together. We started with the minimum but it's gained momentum and has become a proper festival.

The Pioneer reported in April of HTC events deciding to leave the town following a disappointing response for a call for funding, leading to a rebrand as the Rhos-on-Sea Pirate Weekend.

Steven Consterdine, manager of the Bank of Conwy Said: "When we heard the news it was going, we couldn't believe somebody would take the pirate weekend from us. Within four hours it was back on."

The event is intended to be a rerun of its first year, with attractions including a pirate camp, a visit from the Vilma pirate ship with a cannon aboard and later brought on the quay, barrel and keg runs and a smugglers market made up of Conwy businesses.

Conwy RNLI will host a plank walk, Conwy Mussels will hold a crabbing competition and the event is also being supported by the Chamber of Trade.

Toby Tunstall, Chamber of Trade chairman and a co-founder said: "Best of luck to Rhos-on-Sea with their event, but ours will be more of a non-commercial event. This has come about because the real pirates of the Liverpool Pirate Bretheren, who dress up seriously in the proper gear wanted to stay in Conwy."

"Everyone is getting together with it and the businesses are supporting it."

The event's website, conwypirates.com is expected to go live in the next five days with more information.

Mr Blamire added: "Luckily I bought the website name two years ago just in case something like this happened, so we'd have something to fall back on."