[IMC-Video] Re: Video Venue Locations

[Kate]

After doing movie nights in two different cities for two years, I wanted to throw out some suggestions.

1) Maintaining the same-day, same-time thing.  Lots of folks just show up just to show up and see something, even though they might not get the flyer.  This is good for people who might not have e-mail or a planner, but "hey - it's Wednesday - I wonder what the Iron Rail is showing?"

2) Invite other organizations to present movies.  They can either bring their own film or present on a film that you've already chosen to show.  They will bring out their own crowd and it will be much more diverse than the outreach you can do yourself.

3) Be aggressive about the e-mail list.  I often walk around with the e-mail list after the film and talk to folks about what they thought about the film!  Very good way to snag future viewers.

4) Free popcorn is insanely cheap and then you can sell/ask for donations for sodas or juice.

5) If you do a weekly movie night, alternate "responsiblity" with another person, so you each only have to do one night every two weeks and can spread flyering between the two people.  

6) Sponsoring / hosting a human rights film festival is a great way to get people to see great movies and get strangers to go to different venues they've never been to before.
 ~ Kate





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"Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people's minds and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead."
                    --Arundhati Roy
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From:  	victori at resist.ca
To:  	imc-video at lists.indymedia.org
Subject:  	Re: [IMC-Video] Video Venue Locations
Date:  	Thu 02/24/05 03:02 PM

Here's some good suggestions for setting them up locally

Look for library rooms, Pizza places, independent theaters, cafes,
restaurants. Places like these are great because you accidentally show
your stuff to an unreached community and minimal promotion is necessary
because you're using their patrons. However do promote because the more
patrons you bring, the more militant you can get with your content 
without
being asked to not come back. To secure these venues, do not charge
admission and explain to the owner who you are and what you're planning 
to
do. You can easily get your funding from passing a jar and this way the
owner will not charge you or ask for a cut.

Do not use activist centric spaces no matter how tempting it may be. 
Often
activist centric spaces do not feel open to the public and/or are not
close to popular areas of towns. Plus almost always they'll need to 
charge
to maintain the space and then you'll have to charge to pay them leaving
you with no money or worse minus money. Always a lot of promotion work 
is
necessary to get the public to these types of spaces.
However if your goal is to get people to start using the space and get 
the
general public there. Then yes do it. But keep in  mind who exactly you
are targeting and why.

For multiple shows, reserve a day every month ie the last monday of the
month for one venue and the first wednesday at another. Schedule them 
for
the next 3 months(usually this is the farthest ahead allowed). When you
make your monthly flyers, radio, print, and electronic announcements
include all these dates for the month on each of them. Try hard not to
change the routine. This way people will follow the routine and your
promotion efforts can kick back a notch while your audience does the 10-10
friend game(as long as the shows run smoothly and everyone's happy). 
Also
pass around an announce email list sign up sheet. We currently have
somewhere around 300-500 on ours. With doing all this I was able to do 
up
to 8 shows per month. If promotions and venue placement are done
thoughtfully, often these shows can be a persons first intro to indy.
Always direct the audience to other current projects in your imc. Always
stick around afterward to cleanup after your audience and direct all
interested folks individually to other imc projects through 1 on 1
conversation. It really helps to have folks from the other projects
available to point to.

That's all I can think of for now. If anyone has any questions feel free
to ask, I did this for a year and a half or so and tried a lot of things.

Solidarity,
            Victory!