The process in a nutshell:
- You make contact, we like the offer and we respond.
- We negotiate fees and discuss potential dates which would work for you and for us and we ‘pencil’ those dates with you. (We’re asking you not to offer those dates to someone else during this time – but if the offer of a lifetime comes in please just call us to talk about it!)
- We’ll agree a deadline for when we’ll get back to you with firm bookings but please remember this can shift a bit. (As a rule we’re confirming dates with venues approx 6 months before the season)
- We send out the artists menu (the selection of artists, show info and their penciled dates) to our venue hosts.
- The venue hosts have a deadline to respond to us, inevitably we have to do a bit of chasing to get responses. We then collate that info and create the tour.
- We respond to you and confirm your dates with a contract between us, the venue and yourself.
We are always available to talk to our selected artists during the process of confirming their dates.
If you would like to apply to perform in our venues we need as much information as possible about your show. Once we’ve agreed to put you on our menu we’ve got to sell the show to our venue hosts so the more info we have, the better.
Important info:
- The size of performance space – don’t forget the height of your set
- Style of performance (do you need a stage, is it performed in the round, traverse, end on, walk about?)
- The number of people on tour (performers, technical staff and production team)
- Is it technically self sufficient?
- Does it require blackout?
- If you’re happy to tell us your fee, does the fee include accommodation / travel / VAT?
- A brief description of the show, this might differ from the marketing copy you’ve produced for audiences.
- Age suitability / explicit content, swearing or triggering themes.
- If we’ve never seen your work it helps us to see examples of the show you’re proposing (we acknowledge that sometimes this is not possible).
Quirks of rural touring you might not already know:
- You need to provide us with marketing materials – we like A4 posters and A5 (double sided) flyers. We can overprint or create labels for each event so don’t waste time making a listings section, the info is never sufficient and always leads to a mistake somewhere.
- There’s nowhere to hide – you might be changing in a cupboard, you’ll definitely be packing up with audience members still in the room and they’ll want to stay and ask questions about you.
- You’re often invited to the pub after the show.
- We don’t offer homestays but some rural schemes do.
- We often feed you before a show (we say ‘often’ because our library venues don’t have the capacity to do this, but rural venues will ask you what you want for ‘tea’ – and that’s your evening meal if you weren’t sure!)
- Check where you’ve parked – no one wants you to have to stop your gig to move the van for a farmer in his tractor!
Still considering touring with us? Excellent!
Company-Information-Form – PDF
Company-Information-Form – Word version