Pride, etc Top Tips for Running a Bi Stall at Pride Pride, etc Top Tips for Running a Bi Stall
By Jen Yockney Welcome!
Thinking of running a bi stall at a local Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Pride event? This guide aims to take you through the key issues you’ll need to consider in advance.
Advance Preparation People Literature Stall Appearance Media Parade Followup Money
Feedback on this guide and suggestions of improvements would be very welcome indeed.
Advance Preparation No matter how far off your Pride Don’t panic, do ask for ideas and advice event is, the best time to start via the activists network and Livejournal. preparing is now. Life will get in the (see glossary for details!) way if you put it off, and there’s nothing quite like being three days Get in touch with the Pride team - there out from the event and knowing the will normally be a contact number or plan is all in place and the box of bi email address on the website - and ask Pride materials is packed and ready about getting a stall for a local LGBT to be picked up as you leave the community group, and about joining the house on Saturday morning. parade with a banner. There may be a form they want to send to you to If it was Pride yesterday, what better complete and you can check on the moment for writing up what worked well prices they will be charging. or badly on the bi stall, if any, and what things you found attracted you to others. Make sure you get your stall booking form submitted in plenty of time - at If it’s Pride next weekend, you can still some events space is limited and stalls pull something off. will be allocated on a first come, first served basis. People Perfectly good Pride presences have been done with just three people, but you would really like more.
If you have a couple of months before the event, get flyers or a news item in BCN. Also advertise your plans on Livejournal. Remember – people will want a date, time, meeting place and phone number.
Even the day before the event you can advertise online, again with a meeting place, time and mobile number for late arrivals to call so they Tell BCN you’re planning a can find you. Livejournal is the best place at the moment, though you stall - and advertise in may also want to post to any Facebook event page for the Pride their pages for helpers! festival, and major Facebook bi groups like the ones for BCN and the B*R*A.
If you have a stall, try to set up a rota with e.g. two-hour long slots and keep a copy of the rota taped to the table on the day. Get the mobile numbers of helpers so if they don’t show up on time you can text / call to remind them they should be there.
Stall helpers, especially the more committed helpers, will be there for some time. So you need to look after them! It helps if you plan in advance to have food and drink for the helpers on the stall - flapjacks, fruit etc.
If on the day you realise you have forgotten about these it’s worth looking at other stalls which may be giving away snacks or bottled water.
Make sure you get some good photos of the stall at the less busy times of day, with a variety of your helpers in the photo. When they post their photos on Facebook later your group gets an extra publicity hit! Stall Appearance The shape and size of the stall may be limiting factors here, but try to consider the experience of finding your stall from the point of view of a visitor to it. Is it clear what the stall is about? Does it look professional? Are you drawn in and welcomed?
This also raises an important issue for anyone helping out on the stall. Chances are they will meet friends, or after the parade ends people will want to meet up back at the Ten people behind a stall: great for stall. They should be reminded not to ‘crowd out’ the stall such that a photo, but scary for new people potential visitors have to fight their way to the leaflets, and also that while approaching it to find out more! helping on the stall the most important thing is the stranger visiting - not their knitting, their newspaper or friend who they want to chat to.
A crib sheet taped to the table may help, with reminders such as SMILE and make eye contact Say hello Offer stickers and leaflets Ask if they are bi - and if so, would they like to sign up for the mailing list If they have a question you don’t know the answer to, suggest when someone else will be on the stall or other sources of info e.g Pride info points, BCN. Keep the front of the stall clear of friends / group members so new people can approach
Literature Things that are across the whole festival. Print your group web useful to have on address in small letters underneath. your stall include: A campaign or petition on bi inclusion - if there is A ‘signup’ sheet a local LGB organisation for example that is weak to be kept in touch on bi issues and you feel needs pressure, or – name, email something in the media recently such as negative address, and where portrayal on TV. Some pride goers want to party from (so you can separate out ‘locals’ from those but others will welcome a political ‘edge’ to the from further afield). You may get anything from stall. half a dozen to a couple of hundred signups depending on the event, the stall, and sheer luck! You will have several target audiences for your Pride Leaflets about the local bi group, and other groups literature, and after a while on the stall you learn nearby (so for example a Birmingham stall might which of your selection of leaflets is most useful to carry flyers about Manchester and the East each! Midlands) Bi local people who come to the stall Copies of the ‘Both Directions’ guide to the UK bi Bi people from further away who come to the scene stall Copies of BCN or subscription flyers for it (or Other people who come to the stall both!) Other organisations who are exhibiting e.g. youth Stickers with “bi” or “bifriendly” printed on them projects, trades unions, political parties, local to sticker stall visitors and thus raise visibility council, police. The Parade
Many Prides have a parade or march, and this will have a different audience from a stall. You’ll want a banner and three poles – you’d be surprised how much even a lightweight banner can sag in the middle without a horizontal pole across the top, and you want your group name or message to be readable.
Be aware that parade routes will take a lot longer as part of a march than they would to walk ordinarily so not all group members may be eager, or physically be able to do the march. Such people can still be very helpful and part of the team either by preparing the stall while you are marching, or getting a good vantage point along the route to get photos of your group on parade.
If you have the time and the collective enthusiasm, you may want a ‘theme’ or group image for your march entry. For example London’s Bisexual Underground group have often had a ‘wear purple for Pride’ theme with colour co-ordinated marchers, while Manchester’s BiPhoria have entered as the “Bisexual Recruitment Army” carrying bubble-guns and wearing camo print. This is not essential though - the main thing is having a clear readable banner that makes sure the bis are a visible part of the parade.
Encourage anyone taking part to bring a bottle of water and – as this is Britain – a brolly. Clever shopping around may find you some cheap pink brollies, blue ones and purple ones, giving a bi flag effect as long as marchers manage to stay in line in the right order!
If you can’t get or can’t afford a stall, joining in a Pride parade is usually free or under £20 for a walking entry, is an easy ‘hit’ for visibility, and you can then try to get bi flyers onto other organi- Below: an example bi stall email sign-up sation stalls. sheet - write a dummy entry at the top so people don’t feel they are the first to sign up!
Bi Info By Email! Sign Up To Keep In Touch Note: We will not share your details with any commercial organisations and will only use them to let you know about bi community groups and resources.
Name Email Address Where from e.g Manchester, Leeds Jen [email protected] Swindon It would be a shame to organise the first ever You may also get unplanned attention, as some bi stall at Bloggstown Pride without anyone Prides will have local or internet radio or TV ever getting to know about it. There are two stations touring the stalls looking for people to ways that will happen: proactively through interview. The first thing to remember is that your work, and reactively if the media take an you can say ‘no’ to taking part. However, if you interest. have someone who is reasonably confident or has Media any media experience, and knows about any local You can actively seek attention – the bi press bi group and wider bi issues, it can be a great way (BCN magazine, BiMedia website) will run stories to help raise your profile. Stall helpers who are about your plan to have a stall with details of how not interviewed may also get a boost from people can get in touch with you to volunteer or knowing that they were part of something that where to find you on the day. was on the local TV/radio – it sounds more impressive when they tell their friends what they If it’s the first time there has been a bi stall at the were doing with the weekend! event, that is newsworthy so you could also send a note about that to the regional LGBT press.
Post-Pride follow up email sent following Manchester Pride 2008. Followup To: new-recruits@... Phew, Pride is over, you’ve packed up the stall, sent your photos to BCN and Hello there, BiMedia, bought a drink for the brave Thanks for signing up for info about the bi community at Pride this person who did the interview with the weekend. local BBC radio station, gone home and had a long soaky bath to unwind. Here are a few links to get you moving in the right direction!
The local group in Manchester is BiPhoria, for people aged 18+ who are bi It’s not all over yet though! or think they may be. They meet for discussion social-support at the LGF on Princess St/Bloom St, first Tuesday of the month. Next is 2nd Sept and Make notes about what did or did new members should try to get there for 7.30pm sharp: more at not work well to learn from for next www.biphoria.org.uk year’s stall To keep in touch with the wider bi scene you might want to subscribe to Go through the email addresses you Bi Community News, www.bicommunitynews.co.uk the journal of the UK bi collected on the stall and email each movement. one. If they were local, email about the local group / events and with Next weekend is BiCon, which might be slightly short notice - links to BCN and BiCon; if from www.bicon2008.org.uk - a four day long residential bi conference/convention, also open to partners, friends, allies etc. further afield, add in a link to the BCN website, saying that is where If you're interested in activism and campaigning kind of stuff, there's they can find out about any groups the annual Bi Activism conference right here in Manchester on the 4/5 down their way. October. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/uk-bi-activism/ is the email list Make sure you send individual for people interested in going to that or involved in wider bi activism such as running groups, writing for BCN, or lobbying for better emails or “BCC” them – you representation in the media. wouldn’t want your boss, child or partner to first find out you were There are also several bi community events each year, sadly as we're at bisexual from seeing your name the end of the summer there aren't any dates lined up in the near future - copied in on an email circulation! but watch www.bifest.org for smaller one-day events. Don’t put doing this off – memory Hope you had a good Pride and see you again soon! fades, especially slightly drunken Pride memory, and people will have Best wishes, forgotten giving you their email address in a couple of weeks’ time! Glossary
Activists Network – an email “yahoogroup” for people making things like Pride stalls happen. www.yahoogroups.com/groups/uk-bi-activism BCN – Bi Community News. www.bicommunitynews.co.uk BiCon – www.bicon.org.uk or write to BM BiCon. London, WC1N 3XX BiMedia – www.bimedia.org a website for UK bi news, will carry advance notice of your stall / parade plans and photos afterwards. Email [email protected] LiveJournal – a ‘journalling’ website a bit like a collection of blogs. If you want to get help with a Pride stall or encourage people to visit, the best place to post a message is at bicon.livejournal.com
You can get money to run stalls and make banners from: Money Your own pocket Money can be a big issue for Approaching BiCon for making Pride stalls happen and in a funding as a bi stall with few areas it can be prohibitive. their leaflets on will help Your likely costs are: raise their profile Passing round a Stall payment hat/envelope at bi group Banner / other props meetings each month (this Materials to hand out is a good plan as a few pounds a month builds up Stalls will cost anything from £10 to a useful sum over a to £500 depending on the event year!) and whether you can get a Outside funding bodies (you will discounted rate as an LGBT sector usually need things like a bank ac- group. count in the name of your bi group for this) If you have no funding at all it may be worth asking whether you could get a reduced rate, but accept that Pride organisers are running a large event that needs to break even so they usually cannot be as generous as you might like!