Goal: Help a local band to tour Switzerland

[Ice 9]

I live in a midwestern city and love a local band. They play mostly locally, though they have toured to other midwestern cities such as Chicago and Minneapolis. It would be great if I could create their opportunity to tour where they normally never could: Switzerland.

I've heard that for wealth building, it's good to set goals knowing exactly how much money it would take. You should know how much money it will take to build that house, how much is needed to take a year off to scuba dive and study in Indonesia, etc. For this reason, I want to calculate how much it would cost to take this band on a short tour of Switzerland. I would go with them as their sponsor, interpreter, and photographer.

I'm not sure where to begin to calculate this. This band is not well enough known to sell out large arenas such as wherever Jewel would play in Zurich or Geneva. If this band played in Denver, they would not play at the Pepsi Center, but rather in small bars. I'm sure there are lots of venues like that in Switzerland. I would have to find contacts there to book them. Of course a flight would need to be chartered. There's no way you could take a commercial flight and check all those instruments and equipment. No way. You would need to charter flights there and back and rent some kind of bus. Finding out the cost of hotels is no problem. That's easy enough to find out via online sites like Orbitz. However, I have no clue how to find out prices on chartering flights or renting the kind of bus that can accommodate a band's equipment. And, of course, there's making sure the equipment will work on Europe's electrical systems. And it wouldn't be bad to do a pre-tour promo such as attempting to get radio stations to play their songs and maybe even interviews.

The band members all have regular jobs. They're not people who can take 9 months off to tour, at least not at their band's present level of popularity. I'm therefore thinking of something like a 4 to 5 week tour. If I could make this happen for them, it would be a dream come true for me and for them.

Any insight on how I can calculate these costs would be much appreciated.

[rickz]

really good question, well i'm also in the music industry, i am a dj and producer, i would need to know the genre of the band, and first you need to do an EP (this is very important) currently RCA records is gettin submissions from electro-rock bands and that type of genres, check them out, also you need exposure, upload music to itunes and promote them, you need to throw a big party (that's how i mainly got local exposure), and you need a promoter for the tour (in here i can't help you it's all by your own).

[Moneytree]

Hey Ice.

I, myself, also play in a band (lead singer, what up? ), and we're planning a tour now in May here in Sweden.

What we did, was basically this:

Start destination: Stockholm
End destination: Stockholm

Alright, so we're trying to go from Stockholm, to 10 other cities, and then back to Stockholm, right?

Find out what other bands there are within the same genré in other cities, send them a PM explaining about your tour. Tell them that if they get you a gig in their town, providing travelexpenses, you will do the same for them.

Do this to 5-10 other bands.

Now you got all your shows booked, but you've promised (let's say 5) 5 other bands a show in your hometown.

It's really easy to book a show yourself, all you need is patience.
Tell the bands that they will get their travelexpenses after the show, providing that they will get people to come. The bands will be cocky and think "Yeah, we'll get people, no worries" and either,

a) They will get people
b) They won't.

If a) occurs and your tickets to the show goes for like 6-10€, you will get enough money to pay all the bands and even your own band.

If b) occurs and your tickets to the show goes for like 6-10€, you will just have to tell them that this is the money we got, and it's because of them. It's not your fault, it's their fault and they will understand that. So just divide all money you got from the show and give the money to the bands.

Here in Sweden, it's really easy to get a funding / contribution from some sort of association, 'cause they always found music entertaining, so you should check that out.

Or you can just pay some guy like 2-300€ to get all of your shows booked, including travelexpenses. Allthough, then it won't feel like you're doing anything.

Good luck, man!

- Moneytree

EDIT: Oh, also, book the shows ONLY on Friday/Saturdays. That way, more people will come
EDIT 2: Ah, and also the bandmembers won't have to take off work.