Advice on Starting a Festival

[TomAz]

Llama why won't you say what town you are talking about? Is it college station? Cuz if you're talking Beaumont you're fucked.

[RotationSlimWang]

Make it a really gay festival.

[gaypalmsprings]

Make it a really gay festival.

This.

Perhaps call it Tessa Fest, with lesbians forming a human Tesla Coil.

[mountmccabe]

Cuz if you're talking Beaumont you're fucked.

Wow, Tom, you're good.



What size is the mini festival in two weeks?

Can I assume you're planning this for March 2014? What size are you hoping for that? Several hundred? A thousand?


In Phoenix Stateside Presents has been doing SxStatesde shows, which are something along the lines of what you may be envisioning. They had 8-10 bands play at existing venues The Rhythm Room or The Sail Inn, adding an outdoor stage to the former (and utilizing the often unused outdoor stage at the latter), often a show before and a show after. Working it through the venue means there's very little extra to do and you get 3 times as many bands to play/attract concert goers.

It does, however, sound like you're going for an outdoor thing for a thousand or more... in which case yeah, you'll need insurance, security, fences, staff, etc. The people at the venues around you may be able to help you figure this sort of thing out; they'll know what the local laws are, they'll know where to get insurance, etc. Partnering with a venue - even if you don't have that venue as part of the festival (though it could be the late night shows as your outdoor thing may have to end early because of noise ordinances) - will help you pull this off.

And yeah, don't expect to make profit on this.

[OnlyNonStranger]

What you want to do has already been done.

[stinkbutt]

That's a pretty solid lineup

[TomAz]

What you want to do has already been done.

Denton is like 5 hours from houston, dickweed.

[Llama of Time]

Llama why won't you say what town you are talking about? Is it college station? Cuz if you're talking Beaumont you're fucked.

I am talking Beaumont. I seriously have faith I can have something here. We have a pretty kicking little scene. A show with just a local band headlining can have a good 100-300 person crowd on a weekend night. Hope is that I can draw from nearby Louisiana cities (Lake Charles, Sulphur), and maybe Galveston and Houston if I'm lucky.

It definitely will be hard and won't be a for sure-fire thing, but having lived here for a long time, I have some faith it can work.

Wow, Tom, you're good.



What size is the mini festival in two weeks?

Can I assume you're planning this for March 2014? What size are you hoping for that? Several hundred? A thousand?


In Phoenix Stateside Presents has been doing SxStatesde shows, which are something along the lines of what you may be envisioning. They had 8-10 bands play at existing venues The Rhythm Room or The Sail Inn, adding an outdoor stage to the former (and utilizing the often unused outdoor stage at the latter), often a show before and a show after. Working it through the venue means there's very little extra to do and you get 3 times as many bands to play/attract concert goers.

It does, however, sound like you're going for an outdoor thing for a thousand or more... in which case yeah, you'll need insurance, security, fences, staff, etc. The people at the venues around you may be able to help you figure this sort of thing out; they'll know what the local laws are, they'll know where to get insurance, etc. Partnering with a venue - even if you don't have that venue as part of the festival (though it could be the late night shows as your outdoor thing may have to end early because of noise ordinances) - will help you pull this off.

And yeah, don't expect to make profit on this.

For the first year, I'd be happy with 800-1,500 people. I don't think thats out of the question at all, as long as I keep ticket prices at a reasonable price. I'm pretty sure most of the local bands would be behind this (its a chance to play to much bigger crowds then usual, at much more prime spots then any out of town fest), and if I got the big 5 or so I'm thinking of, I think that could guarantee at least about 500-600 people right there without paying much. I think people are overestimating how big I want this to be. I'd like it to get bigger in the future but I'd be much better off starting small and growing from there. Main reason I am thinking outdoors is because I don't know of a good venue here with that size or bigger that I could actually use. Plus it'd be really cool to get vendors involved (Have a smaller scale festival coming up like I mentioned in this thread, had no problems getting vendors for that). I know of at least one venue owner thats wants to do a SXSW overflow show like this but never has a venue, they tried doing a show in a Warehouse last year and that didn't go down so well (police got involved, I don't know the whole story) so they can't use that again.

Though there is actually a seldom used venue here that'd be perfect for this, but I'm figuring it'd probably be a pain to get them let me use it. Lots of corporate stuff with it. Could be wrong. I'll probably at least shoot them an inquiry. It'd cut down on cost a whole lot as far as what you mentioned, but at the same time they might charge quite a lot for us to use it so it might not be worth it (because you gotta factor in that in the outdoors venue we get a little extra boost from vendors and concession sales). But besides that venue, there's no venue I could think have that could hold 1,000 or more people here, which is why I'm thinking outdoors.

I'm friends with the owner of the most popular venue for local shows (which is where those 100-300 person shows happen) and already mentioned the idea to him in passing. He seemed definitely interested (he actually planned to do something similar in the same spot a few years back but it fell through for whatever reason, I think having it around SXSW will help a lot to make this actually happen). Also have another friend that runs another popular venue that I haven't mentioned this to, but I'm pretty certain she'd be down. Plan on getting them together in the next month and giving them my pitch and seeing what they think. They'll definitely know laws better then me. Part of the reason I'm asking around for advice is to have a better pitch for them.

What you want to do has already been done.

Denton is an over 5 hour drive from here, and about 4-5 hours from Houston. 35 Denton is always awesome looking but it doesn't really pull many people from this area.

[mountmccabe]

35 Denton (and SxStateside, even) isn't a substitute or really a competitor but it could be a model. It could be part of your pitch; hey, they are doing this sort of thing on the western approach to Austin; we could do this here in Beaumont on the eastern approach.


But I don't have any actual practical advice so I will go away.

[koryp]

35 Denton (and SxStateside, even) isn't a substitute or really a competitor but it could be a model. It could be part of your pitch; hey, they are doing this sort of thing on the western approach to Austin; we could do this here in Beaumont on the eastern approach.


But I don't have any actual practical advice so I will go away.

Or geographical, Denton being kinda north of Dallas and all.

[malcolmjamalawesome]

What do you prefer we do here? (a) Actually help - which is just telling you that you appear to be so clueless that by even attempting to do this you are going to yield disastrous results for yourself; or (b) continue flaming you?

[guedita]

I marvel at the fact that anyone ever would ask the Coachella Message Board for advice on ANYTHING. I mean, look at us. We're miserable excuses of human beings.

[SepaGroove]

I marvel at the fact that anyone ever would ask the Coachella Message Board for advice on ANYTHING. I mean, look at us. We're miserable excuses of human beings.

Speak for yourself...





Ok fine, I'm a miserable excuse of a human being.