Strategies for starting a dance?
- On college
campuses start a club to get funding. Recruit friends, make
announcements – classes, newspaper, dance groups, other clubs.
Create a great elevator speech. Have the dance somewhere very
visible where people will just wander by – and then come in because
it is (ideally) free.
- Perform in
public or at a dance event with different types of dance
- Try to get
college to sponsor vans to local dance(s)
- If it’s all
young beginners (ex: college) do some fun easy kiddie
contra-ishdances in addition to real contras. People want to have
fun and not think the whole time.
- Make colorful
poster (with crayons!)
- Advertise to
school activities board as an “alcohol free event”!
- Move the town
contra dance to within walking/biking distance of campus
- Organize a
“field trip” to an established dance as a seed, make it regular
and use the momentum to organize once a core group is “hooked”
- Pool
resources/people from several nearby schools to have a bigger dance
instead of several small ones.
- If a college
club without a lot of experienced dancers, host other related/folk
events to increase interest without the problem of a bad experienced
to not-experienced ratio (ex: folk sing/shapenote, etc…)
- Make
movie/culture references. Jane Austen, English folk (Morris, etc.)