Music Merchandising (merch.)

What's the first thing you think of when you think of music/band/artist merch?

 

???

WHY TO ARTISTS SELL MERCH?

It is a welcomed revenue stream! Cash from the merch desk is also very useful on tour when you need to pay for petrol and PD's (Per Diem aka daily allowance for expenses). Believe it or not, fans do want to support and merch money usually goes direct to the artist so it's a nice way that they can connect.

Interesting merch offers have also really helped keep some musician's afloat during COVID as they haven't been able to play live.

The more merch you sell, the more of a visual presence you have too. The Swell Maps had a resurgence of interest in them after Evan Dando wore one of their T-Shirts on his album cover.

Important points to consider:

BRANDING - you need to keep your branding consistent. Use the same logo so that fans identify with it and, if it is to promote a specific album, replicate the artwork in your merch. Many acts have a whole new range of merch for each tour to cement the branding if the album.

AUDIENCE - know your audience! You need to offer merch that they will actually buy. Think about your genre too - is there anything specific that you think would work?

LIMITED EDITION - limited edition items always sell well.  People love collecting things and making something limited edition can add both monetary and aesthetic value to it. With so many mass produced things being too readily available, perhaps something more unique can be quite special.

It all depends on your vibe and your audience though - it's worth seeing what similar artists do but still try to remain faithful to your own brand/ethos.

It's not all about band T-shirts and CDs though. Examples of innovative merchandising in music:

• Bjork released Biophilia as an app and a film with some really interesting art work 

• British Sea Power sell Kendle Mint Cake amongst other things

• Iron Maiden started to brew their own beer even!

DIY - what can you make yourself? What can your friends help you make?

Have a look at some of these weird and wonderful EXAMPLES

There are some good ideas on dittomusic too.

TASK: Think what merch might work for you and how it would aid communication about you and your 'brand'. What would be the most effective and why?

http://www.onestopbandshop.co.uk/

http://www.awesomemerchandise.com/

[there are loads more!]

Promotion: how to and how NOT to!

When you are promoting a live event, the ultimate aim of this is to get people to come to the event.  In order to do that there are some vital things to ensure you do properly.  There are also things that can go horribly wrong if you get them wrong.

What are you promoting?

• Will the act bring people in?
• Is the venue a suitable size?
• What about location?

How will you fund it?

• Can you get help with advertising through sponsorship?
• Do you need to put a deposit down at the venue?
• Are you offering guarantees to the act or a door split?

Dealing with the band.

• Do you have their tech spec and have to definitely sent it to the engineer?
• Do they require unusually high ceiling clearance?
• What is the line-up and do they know how much space there is on stage?
• Is there somewhere for them to change/store gear?
• Will you be providing them with a rider?
• If there is more than one act, have you arranged sharing of backline with them to minimise changeover times?
• Have you set aside enough time for soundcheck?

Promoting the event.

• Have you crated a facebook event and encouraged the acts to spread the word?
• Local listings?
• Can you print posters/fliers and put them up in the venue before hand?
• Have you planned a marketing strategy? i.e What info will you put out and how often?

A while ago, I did a show that was 'promoted' by possibly the worse promoter in the world.  Disaster from start to finish.  To begin with, he was very communicative by email, so we were quite confident that he was well organised.  When we got there at 4pm to load in however, no one was at the venue and the bar staff didn't seem to know what was going on.  When he finally showed up (6:30pm?) he didn't even introduce himself to us - I figured out that it was him from his photo on facebook and had to go over and make myself known to him.  We waited around for the sound engineer but he wasn't booked to come in until 7pm.  That meant we had to wait for 3 hours.  Also, doors were at 7:30pm.  It is completely impossible to soundcheck 4 bands in half and hour.  The sound engineer hadn't been sent out specs and said he would have come in earlier if he'd been asked to.  When I gave him our channel list he was quite panicked - the venue didn't have enough mics or channels and he'd have been able to get more in if he'd have known in advance! There was also no where for us to store our instruments.  When I asked him about it, he actually asked me to ask at the bar!

After all this faffing about, we were pretty hungry as we'd been up since 5am and had driven a massive 8 hours from Glasgow to Norwich.  The promoter had said he'd order us pizza in but didn't do this until 8pm, by which time, the first band had almost set up and, as the doors were open, we had to eat it outside in the freezing cold because it wasn't bought from the venue.

Everything was running late and there was a curfew of 11pm so we all had to change our sets to make them shorter at the last minute.  The promoter seemed unable to work out timings either. When we finally did get to line check before our set, we couldn't actually fit on the stage properly because he hadn't realised how much space 8 people take up with so many instruments.  Doh!

All of these things were easily avoidable.  Ok, so he was obviously inexperienced but didn't even try to appear like he knew what he was doing.  Shaking hands with him was like someone dangling a limp mackerel at you.  We each made a point of 'bone crushing' him as we said goodbye!

Proof that Norwich is exactly as Alan Partridge portrays it, if ever there was.