[Dixielandjazz] Prospecting for2008 Municipal Gigs

[Steve Barbone]

A reminder that townships, towns, boroughs and cities are thinking NOW about
the programming of their 2008 Summer Concert series.

My experience has been that the best time to direct mail them information
about your band and/or program of "America's Music, Jazz", is  around the
end of October, through mid November. In this area most start signing up
bands in December.

These public summer concerts are the mainstay of Barbone Street's summer
Dixieland gigs. We do a bunch of them and they result in many other gigs,
weddings, parties, fund raisers, schools etc. ALL LOCAL within 80 miles.

My own prospect list for this market segment is now at about 250 and I will
mail band info in a couple of weeks. We get about a 10% booking rate from
the mailer, plus our usual repeats. VERY COST EFFECTIVE since the total
marketing effort costs less than $150.00,including your computer costs for
ink and paper.

Usual concert nights are Sunday, Wednesday, Thursday and a few Saturdays.
The money is good too, if you negotiate properly.

Interestingly enough, in 2007 we had several townships that presented 2
Dixieland concerts (out of 6 or 8 total concerts over the summer) because
OKOM has become very visible and much appreciated here among the general
audiences. Nice work for the Dixieland Bands in this area as well as a grass
roots effort to popularize the music as general audience attendance runs
from 200 to 2000 at the concerts.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone