Everything you need to know to start your own club night.
Tired of dull, samey club nights and think you could do a better job? Maybe you’ve just always dreamed of running a club night of your own. Whatever the reason, starting up and running your own club night is one of the most rewarding and creative endeavours an electronic music fan can undertake. Here is everything you need to know to start your own.
Budget
We know you’re only doing it for the love, but setting up and running a club night can be a costly affair. Try to think of everything you will be spending, from hiring venues and DJs to printing out flyers and posters. Maybe you want your party to have props? You have to budget for those too.
Once you know how much you think it will cost to set up a club night, make sure you can put a little extra aside in case you end up overspending.
Find your venue
Any good club night needs a good venue. Unless you already have a large following, you are going to have to start small. Remember, any venue can come alive on the right night, so don’t write anywhere off if it seems stodgy or boring.
You do, however, need to find a venue that can accommodate your vision. And, perhaps more importantly, it needs to be somewhere that is willing to work with you. Visit as many local venues as you can and talk to the staff to find out rates. This kind of stuff isn’t always on the internet.
Promote
Once you have a venue secured for the night of your choice (or, more likely the night the venue was free), do whatever you can to spread the good word about your night. Go old school with flyers and posters if you can, and never underestimate the power of social media!
These nightclub promotion tips from Simplycast should help you out if you’re stuck for ideas. But remember: the most important thing is to have a good brand for your club night. That can make the difference between people picking up the flyer or walking on by.
Your club night’s branding, of course, will be strongly connected to your vision for the night. Which, despite its absence from our list of three instructions, is actually the most important thing of all.
See, starting a club night is one thing, but running a good club night is something else. Luckily, we have some tips for that in this very article too.
What makes a great club night?
The following things are vital to running an enjoyable and successful club night. You should bear them in mind before you start the club, and you should bear them in mind when you are running the night so you can strive to continually improve.
Be original
Yes, there are club nights we all know and love, but why would someone go to your imitation when they can just go to the real thing? For this reason, whatever you do for your club night you have to make sure it is original.
Being completely original can be risky, but the rewards are huge. If you come up with a fresh idea that really connects with clubbers, you will likely be able to grow your brand, start hosting bigger club nights, and even launch a whole career in running club nights, throwing parties, and even founding a club of your own. If you’re really successful, you could end up releasing a never ending string of compilation CDs a la Ministry of Sound.
Know your audience
At first you may just be setting up a club night for a few pals and the odd fellow clubber with similar music taste, but if you’re doing it right, soon enough you will have ‘an audience’. If you manage to attract this audience, the club night isn’t about you anymore; it’s about them. Stay true to yourself, yes. But remember that these clubbers came to your night for a reason.
Don’t lose what it was that made you unique in the first place, but bear your audience in mind whenever you make decisions going forward.
Book great DJs
You may be an aspiring DJ yourself, or even a pro trying their hand at DIY club nights, but whoever you are, you have to make sure the music at your club night is top notch. That, after all, is what it’s all about.
For an extensive list of the best DJs in House, Hip-Hop and countless other genres, take a look at our DJ roster now.
Good luck!
Image – Propaganda
Got the basis? Now you need an act, look no further than the ever growing MN2S rosters: