Our club meets in a night club - need suggestions

[zamboni88]

Ok we need a little advice here....

We have a great lifestyle club in our area that we. with the help of another couple, started and have been running since January. We are currently meeting once a month at a gay and lesbian night club. The owners of the night club have been very welcoming to us and we enjoy the freedom of the place. Our lifestyle group meets in a private banquet room in the club. We charge an admission to enter the room and all couples who enter receive a wristband so we only allow those who pay to enter and sit in the room. The room seats about 40 - 50 and is nicely decorated. We bring in food as well as the decorations. Our members, however, have full access to the rest of the nightclub and must leave out private room to get a drink at the bar or dance on the dancefloor, etc.

At the last dance, we noticed 2 couples who were there because of our event, but they choose to sit in the public area of the night club and avoid paying the admission fee ($15/couple). Since this couple knew many of the other couples who attended, it was not long before other couples (who paid) were sitting with them.

We want to avoid a situation where more and more couples do the same thing. The money collected helps helps cover our advertising expenses, decorations, food, etc.

Here is where we need help......................

What activities/games would you suggest we perform in our private room that would make couples want to be in there? We want to provide a fun and exciting environment for all of our couples and want them to participate. Keep in mind this is an offsite lifestyle club and we can't get naked.

As always we look forward to hearing from all,

R & A

[sereneiders]

I don't think you could do too much about it. Unless you manage to make every couple understand the need for an extra fee, as for them to ill see those who want to take advantage of the scenario without paying the fee, which doesn't seems to be a realistic goal.

What you're suggesting is that this attitude would change if you were able to privide some added value on top of the effort you're doing to organize the events. If the $15 fee is already being used in the decoration and food, you'd be looking for an added value for free cost, unless you were able to increase the fee (which would decrease the added value). In the other hand, if the $15 fee were allowing you to pay for some aditional resource, then you'd be earning money in the process, which is Ok, but would entitle those couples to choose not to pay the fee without any reason to outcast them from the community.

Parhaps the question is, if what you're providing is something valuable for the rest of the couples. After all, this isn't that much about your idea on what would gether this community togheter, but on what really leads them to gahter togheter. They may not care too much about decoration or food, and some of them (like those "problematic" couples) certainly doesn't.

As I see the problem, your may change the income source.

If you're bringing more attendant to this night club at your events, ask the club owners for a percentage of the income for those couples. Since most of them already have a $15 budget to spend inside the club, you'd be "transferring" this "budget" to the owners pocket because they would spend it at the club bar. So there is a way to estimate the "value" your "customers" provide to the club, as to have some figures to talk about with them.

Keep the wrists identifiers for people to recognize the swingers from other attendants, and the exclusive room. The wrist identifiers, once not implying an extra fee, would be a way to tell appart "your" customers from the club original ones, and to account them in order to apply the percentage to charge to the club owners.

If you bring some other added value, like food, charge an extra fee. You may even offer some of those added values to the non swingers club attendants. This would increase the income for the added values (since you'd be extending the market) and make this added value something valuable also for the club owners.

In any case, I believe it would be hard to make people stick to your wishes. Even those extra activities you're supposing they could want, would be valuable only if THEY appreciate the value, so it'd be better to find a way where you can follow the "market demmand" instead of attempting to build up such a demmand from the scratch.

[Tybee Swing]

Hi R and A,

I don't see the value of what you're offering for $15 a pop. Swingers are consumers, and they have to be getting something for their money. There is only a room to sit around in, and some food to snack on. We're a couple who likes to dance, and we'd be mainly out at the dance floor area socializing if we were there.

Your event is off-premise, and that's the big difference in value. Your function serves as a meet-and-greet, correct? Couples are getting the opportunity to meet swingers face-to-face and socialize, nothing further. The meet-and-greets I've been to have all been free to attend. It's impossible to contol in a public club who can come and go, who can mingle with your group, etc. Word gets out in the swing community, and people just start showing up. In your setting, they can't get into your private room, but they may feel like they're not missing much (and prefer to be in the club vs. in the room). My husband and I founded a monthly meet-and-greet and ran it at a local dance club in the past. It was free - not even a cover charge. If the club had a private room and we could have rented it, we wouldn't have, because nobody would have wanted to stay in there. The kind of room you have sounds okay for initial talking and meeting, but people want to stand around and "just talk" for only just so long.

We know an off-premise very well-organized club that meets in a similiar way that you do, except that they are there weekly every Saturday night. They have a very professional website with great communications going out via email about all their special events, they have themes, contests and all kinds of organized fun, and for the $15 per couple (same price you charge), they get a lot. They have admission to the huge private room which has it's own large bar & bartender, lots of tables, it's own dance floor, and it's own DJ. (The rental, bartender and DJ are paid by the hostess from the admission fees, plus tips). They happen to be adjoining a strip club, and another club as well. For their same $15, swingers get admittance into all the other areas, too. So, it's worth it for them to get the armband and go in through the rented swinger's party room at this club. Even if they leave the rented party room to visit the other areas, they come back because there's plenty to do and that's where the dancing and drinking is, too. This club is Underground Eden in Jacksonville.

[good times]

I have to agree with the others, from what you told us I don't see the value for the admission fee.

We have a local swingers club that is an on-premise club once a month but is normally a gay/cross dresser type bar. They advertise themselves as a "lifestyle" bar that caters to all alternative lifestyles. On the swingers party nights they charge a cover charge for all swingers that are attending the party. The cover charge is reasonable, $10.00 and gets you into the club and also gets you a raffle ticket. They take all of the admission money and buy prizes to be raffled throughout the evening. Their regular patrons I believe are exempt from the cover charge but aren't included in the raffle either, if I remember right.

So, in my opinion, their is nothing you can do with your current setup. I personally don't care for ice breaker games, so, were I to attend your party, I would be more likely to stay in the other room if you offered the games than if you didn't. The only way I could see that you could alleviate the problem would be if you could get the club owners to charge an admission at the door to get into the club for your party (instead of charging to just get into the room), thereby eliminating the ability of people getting in without paying. Other than that I don't see any other way you can correct the problem.

[zamboni88]

Thanks for the responses - here is a little more information.

First let me address the question of what value are our members getting for the $15 they spend.

Our club maintains a nice web site and email list serve that allows us to communicate with lifestyle couples and arrange events where you can meet other couples. We hold 3 different types of events.

(12) MONTHLY MEET AND GREETS - held in a local hotel lounge free of charge - this event is held in part to allow new lifestyle couples to come and meet other couples in a no pressure environment. Attendance has been very good.

(8) MONTHLY NIGHT CLUB DANCES - as described to begin this thread - we hold 8 monthly dances at the gay and lesbian bar and charge $15 to attend in our private banquet room. The cost ($15) helps pay for the ballroom dances below.

(4) MONTHLY BALLROOM DANCES - we hold 4 of these per year - once per calander quarter. We rent a ballroom at a local hotel, with a profession DJ, themes, food, cash bar.

If we did not organize the monthly dance parties at the nightclub there would probably not be one lifestyle couple in attendance. Isn't that a value?

R & A

[Tybee Swing]

Originally Posted by zamboni88

(4) MONTHLY BALLROOM DANCES - we hold 4 of these per year - once per calander quarter. We rent a ballroom at a local hotel, with a profession DJ, themes, food, cash bar.

Hi R & A,

You said that you're using your fees for admittance to the banquet room monthly at the gay/lesbian club to finance your quarterly ballroom dances with DJ, food, themes, bar, etc. How much do you charge couples to get into this quarterly ballroom function? Could you charge enough for this specific event so that the event could pay for itself?

The monthly room at the gay/lesbian club: is this your least popular activity of the three types that you are running, going by comparing attendance and growth with your other events?

The monthly meet-and-greet at the local lounge: does this have dance music? You say this has been very popular and well-attended, and it's free. (This is exactly the kind of party my husband and I were hosting, and same environment. It grew like wildfire.)

Is your lifestyle organization not-for-profit?

[zamboni88]

Originally Posted by Tybee Swing

Hi R & A,

You said that you're using your fees for admittance to the banquet room monthly at the gay/lesbian club to finance your quarterly ballroom dances with DJ, food, themes, bar, etc. How much do you charge couples to get into this quarterly ballroom function? Could you charge enough for this specific event so that the event could pay for itself?

We could but would rather keep the cost lower. We did a survey of our membership and asked then what were the most important elements of a dance to them in order of importance. The top 4 most important elements were.

1. A friendly/fun atmosphere.
2. The opportunty to flirt with others.
3. A good crowd.
4. A good DJ/Music.

We feel that offsetting the ballroom dance expenses and keeping the admission price lower helps bring in a larger crowd.

Originally Posted by Tybee Swing

The monthly room at the gay/lesbian club: is this your least popular activity of the three types that you are running, going by comparing attendance and growth with your other events?

It is very popular -we have only had one dance there to date and it was very well attended.

Originally Posted by Tybee Swing

The monthly meet-and-greet at the local lounge: does this have dance music? You say this has been very popular and well-attended, and it's free. (This is exactly the kind of party my husband and I were hosting, and same environment. It grew like wildfire.)

The meet and greet is held at a location that does not have music or a dance floor. We are not a non profit.

R & A

[JustAskJulie]

I have to agree with the earlier comment that a) you may want to look at increasing the cost of the ballroom dance to help it cover itself.
b) if you are holding your event at a club that is open to the public and most likely they already paid a fee to access the club itself you have to give them some incentive to pay that extra fee to enter the "swinger only" room. I'm guessing that most people probably mix and mingle out into the main club at some point during the nights since that's probably where the dancefloor and dj are anyway. At that point the one suggestion I could make to you would be to perhaps try to work it so that (assuming there is a separate bar area in your private room) that the people in that room get a lower rate on drinks or some other + to being in that room since the swingers are eventually going to come out of that room anyway.
c) the people who really want to support what you have going on are going to pay to get in no matter what... that goes back to making sure that they understand what they are getting for their money.

We have a local social here that is held in a local gay/lesbian club as well except that the club is not open during regular hours so when we have our socials we take over the club, then later in the evening it opens to the public and other folks come in. The club itself is set up so that it has a main level then a balcony area. When the club is open to the public they term the balcony as the VIP area and charge a double admission to access it. There are two main benefits that you get... well 3. 1. A respite from the crowded dance floor where there are (2) comfortable seating options and a slightly quieter area where you can talk and (3) a bar with fewer patrons leading to faster drink service.

So perhaps you may want to look into seeing what you can do to make your "VIP" area feel a little more "VIP" like and then just put it out there that people can join you at the club without admittance to the VIP area but if they do pay to access they not only get to support all of your clubs activities (and keep the overall costs lower) but they also get XY&Z benefits that night. For most just a place to get away from the loud music of a dance floor will be enough to pay some extra fee... but not necessarily an extra $15.

I think you may want to run another poll of your members and see what's more important to them a lower cost of the private member only events (and let them know what the cost difference would be) or a lower cost at the bar socials.

[Chicup]

Have a service bar set up in your party area.

Problem mostly solved

[good times]

I have to say that I agree with Julie's suggestions, if you could work that out maybe you could get more people to pay the fee. Maybe you could even work a deal with the owners of the bar to give the participants of your party lower drink prices.

We have a local couple here in Reno that tried to do a similar thing. They worked out a deal with a local dance club who's managers previously ran one of the local on-premise swingers clubs to use their VIP room for a meet and greet. We went to their first and only one and like you they were charging a fee ($5.00) to get into the VIP room. The problem was that we had to pay the regular cover charge to get into the club and their really wasn't any benefit to going into the VIP room as most people wanted to dance. Needless to say, it was a flop, we didn't pay their fee and just sat at the tables by the dance floor and so did everyone else, even those that had payed the fee.

Originally Posted by zamboni88

The top 4 most important elements were.

1. A friendly/fun atmosphere.
2. The opportunty to flirt with others.
3. A good crowd.
4. A good DJ/Music.

While I would probably pick these things in the same order were I answering your survey, the fact is, I wouldn't be willing to pay a fee for any except "#4 - a good DJ/music". The first three you can get at any meet and greet, which are normally free.

Originally Posted by zamboni88

We feel that offsetting the ballroom dance expenses and keeping the admission price lower helps bring in a larger crowd.

I disagree, people would be willing to pay more for a good dance. I don't say this without any experience either, I have been in the dance business for over 25 years. If you have a good DJ, a good sound system, and good music, you can easily get people to pay $20.00 or more for a good night of dancing even at a non-swinger event. When I DJed at a local swingers club recently they charged $40.00 to get in for the night and we packed the club to capacity, the only other night of the year they did that is on New years Eve. We have DJed at several clubs here and the result is always the same, packed house, the door charge is irrelevant because they are getting something of value for the money.

[zamboni88]

Thanks for all of the great comments!

We are meeting with the night club owners to propose they let us hold a monthly "swingers" night where we will take over the club from 7 - 10 PM.

R & A