Atualizando o esquema da tabela sem afetar os dados no Laravel

<?php

use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;

class addColumnFestivalTable extends Migration {

public function up()
{
    Schema::table('festivals', function($table)
    {
        $table->string('new_col_name');
     });

}

public function down()
{
    Schema::table('festivals', function($table)
    {
       $table->dropColumn('new_col_name');
    });
}

}