Pride In Stafford

Something unexpected and brilliant happened last week. A few of our JUICE Fans started up an online campaign to get people to vote for us in the Pride In Stafford Awards. These awards are set up and run by the Town Centre Partnership in Stafford, a really great concept whereby local retailers and business-types all band together to promote Stafford Town and help each other out. They created the Stafford Card, which is a discount card recognised by all the little businesses that sign up to the Partnership. They also promote the Stafford Music and Arts Festival.

The idea behind the awards is simple, anyone can go online and vote for their favourite bar, restaurant, shop etc. in Stafford Town. The JUICE Fans in question want people to vote for JUICE Comedy in the ‘Best Professional Service Business’ catergory, which sounds a bit weird but I guess there’s no other category for which we’d be elligible.

This took us completely by surprise and was really nice and touching. To begin with we thought the campaign was perhaps a bit of mischief making, but the JUICE Fans said that they genuinely thought we should win for all the lovely stuff we do for Staffords arts and culture scene. That made it all the more lovely and meaningful.

Today is the last day you can vote for the Pride In Stafford Awards, so click here if you’d like to go and do that. From the number of people who have said they’ve voted for us, I think we could be in with a real shot to win this award . . . if the organisers will allow it. I doubt we’re what they had in mind for this category, as the examples given on the website include Solicitors, Estate Agents and Opticians. But if the votes for us are overwhelming then perhaps they’ll have no choice.

We genuinely are committed to Stafford. We’re passionate about creating a thriving arts & culture scene in our hometown. It’s really nice that our JUICE Fans recognise this.

Sell-Outs & More

This week saw a rush on tickets for our live event Cocktails & Comedy Part II at Number 15, meaning we’re now completely sold-out for the show. It’s great going into these things sold-out, it means we know that Saturday 2nd June is going to be a great night for everybody. As a promoter you know you’ve got the best talent available when you book your acts, but that’s really only half of the equation. If you can’t fill the venue then the atmosphere just isn’t right, either for the audience members that are there or for the comedians performing. A half-full audience at a smaller venue like Number 15 would be fine, but you can be 100% confident in a show once you’ve sold every seat in the house. Selling-out so far in advance of showtime also indicates that the people who bought tickets are enthusiastic about the event. If you missed out on getting a ticket then you should’ve acted sooner, but stay tuned to JUICE through Facebook, Twitter and the main website, as we’ll be announcing the dates of more Cocktails & Comedy at Number 15.

Our next live event is the New Act / New Material Night at Joxer Brady’s on Bank Holiday Monday May 7th. Our May show is always a little more interesting and exciting than usual, as comedians are gearing up for the Edinburgh Festival in the Summer. This year we’ve got a special performance from professional comic Katie Mulgrew. Katie is the daughter of legendary comedian Jimmy Cricket, and over the years she has carved out an identity and a career all over her own. She regularly performs for big-time comedy clubs like The Stand and The Frog & Bucket, and was even a Finalist in the prestigious, nationwide Funny Women competition.

We’re also looking forward to seeing performances from madcap act Jimmy Incarcerated and Leanne McKie, who are stalwarts of the every-prosperous Leicester comedy scene. We also can’t wait to see Steph Lotus, a comedian we’ve heard lots about but have not yet been able to see in person.

We had a photoshoot on Wednesday morning with our official photographer Kate Gallow. JUICE Founder Rob Halden is in dire need of some professional photos for promotional purposes, all he currently has are drunk camera-phone shots in various states of undress. Kate Gallow has come up with a number of interesting concepts for the pictures, which are going to look really different from the usual, bog-standard photos of comedians. The first shoot called for us to use Stafford high-street coffee shop Starbucks and fill it with extras. We had to do this at 7:30 in the morning so as not to disrupt their normal trade. So the call when out to JUICE fans for volunteers to appear in the pictures. We were so lucky, despite the pouring rain and wind we had Dave, Suzi, Nia, Neil and Holly all arrived for the early morning shoot. The pictures came out looking great, we’ll let you know when their available.

Speaking of Rob Halden, he’ll be giving a very rare performance in Stafford when JUICE takes over The MET Studio in July. Rob has been a driving force in Stafford’s comedy scene for over eight years now, but has never performed at the Gatehouse Theatre. He’ll be on the bill alongside Tom Allsopp, who also has a great following in Staffordshire. We can now confirm that they’ll be supported on 6th July by brilliant comedian Tony Jameson. Tony is a fast-rising talent who plays for all the major weekend comedy clubs and is sure to be a big name in the next couple of years. It’s going to be a blockbuster show, tickets are all ready selling fast so make sure you book yours with the Gatehouse Theatre.

Expanding

Yes, like Rob Halden’s waistline, we are expanding here at JUICE Comedy. Just one week after our Facebook page reached an all-time high of over 1, 000 people, we reached a brand new high of over 2, 000! It’s brilliant that a small Stafford-based promotion is able to reach so many people with our inane chatter and silly messages. On top of that, hundreds of people a week are talking about JUICE on Facebook and Twitter, thanks to things like our ongoing JUICE Videos. If you haven’t seen them yet, the videos feature Rob Halden embarassing himself in a series of dafts ways for the amusement of our audience. We’re gaining more Likers and Followers with every passing week.

In June we’re launching our second Tweet Competition to coincide with Cocktails & Comedy Part II. The best Tweet using #juicecomedy on 2nd of June will win our JUICE Goodie Bag, which contains comedy books and DVD’s. Prizes include DVD’s from Tommy Cooper, Eddie Murphy, Dad’s Army, Mark Watson, The Marx Brothers and Morcombe & Wise. We’ve also got Frankie Boyle’s latest hardback, the Bill Hicks book Love To All The People, and we’ll be giving away Served Raw which is the latest CD from Stafford hard-rocking blues band 44. Pistol. You can only enter the competition by being in the audience at Number 15 on June 2nd.

We’re in the process of outfitting our staff and associates (and a select few audience members) with some custom-made JUICE T-shirts to make them all look sexy-as-heck. The quality of the T-shirts we’re using is top-knotch and we’re really hoping to make something our people will enjoy wearing. It’ll also make us look like a super-professional business-organisation! Which, of course, we definitely are.

Goings On

Ticket sales are going well for both our upcoming live events, Cocktails & Comedy and JUICE at The MET Studio. We were very surprised by how early people were getting tickets for The MET gig. We’d sold a large number in March for a show that takes place in July, which is really great news. Both previous shows at The MET were complete sell-outs, which has no doubt prompted people to get hold of their seats nice and early. Especially with local comedians Tom Allsopp and Robert Halden on the bill, who both have a sizeable following in and around Stafford.

The first Cocktails & Comedy at Number 15 has generated some really good word-of-mouth, something that is essential for a small promotion like us. Through people telling friends and sharing their good experiences on social media and websites like Stafford Forum, it’s created a lot of interest in future shows at Number 15. Although lots of people are asking if we can hold tickets back for them, which unfortunately we just can’t do. If we started doing this then absolutely everyone would want us to hold tickets for them. Why purchase something when you can get someone to reserve it for free? The problem then becomes not being able to sell tickets to customers because we’ve got so many of them ‘on hold’. As days and weeks pass by people are more willing to change their plans for that night because they haven’t actually bought the ticket yet. Which can easily happen and easily leave us and the venue with a pile of tickets we can’t sell. We like being informal with people because we’re obviously not a huge business, but we’ve got to make sure we’re taking care of things professionally.

This week we organised a deal with brilliant Stafford-based blues band 44. Pistol to play their music at all our live events before comedians take the stage, and during the breaks. Music helps set the tone for the entire evening, finding the right sound is essential for creating the right atmosphere. 44. Pistol are a great band and we’re really pleased to be bringing their music to JUICE.

  JUICE Comedy gets inundated with requests from comedians for gigs (so if you’ve been in touch and haven’t heard back, sorry, we’ll get round to you when we can). A lot come from comedians looking for a spot on our New Act/New Material Night, but more and more we’re getting requests from professional comics looking for work. Lots of different factors go into booking someone, but usually if we don’t know the comedian in question then we’ll ask them to come down to the New Act/New Material Night and do a turn on the bill there so that we can see them in action and see what they’re like. We can’t promise anything, but there is a definite chance of progession and it has worked for a number of comedians we’ve seen  over the years. It’s very difficult booking somebody you’ve never seen before or even heard of to perform in front of paying punters. If we’re charging people money then we need to be confident it’s for the best show possible.

We got a message recently from someone looking to break into comedy from the world of poetry. We made our standard offer with a chance of progression, to which the aspiring comedian replied “No, I usually get £100 + expenses + accomodation for a 20 minute set”. Well . . . best of luck to you. A refusal to play the game will certainly do you well in this business.

Unsung Heroes

Whilst we are a small, local Stafford business, there are a number of people involved in making JUICE Comedy what it is. Whilst Rob Halden is the fat, bearded face of the promotion, there are several folks behind-the-scenes who make huge contributions to JUICE.

David Coleman is the Company Director of Offsite Web Design the fantastic Stafford tech team behind our wonderful website! David and his lovely girlfriend Suzi have been coming to JUICE Comedy Nights for years. When we needed help in putting together a professional, good-looking web site that was simple and easy enough for our luddite brains to update and edit, they came through for us! Whenever we have techy problems or questions, David is always kind enough to explain things in short, simple words and the occasional crayon drawing so that we can understand. Without David’s help and hard work, we wouldn’t be able to reach half the people we currently do.

Kate Gallow is the crazy, wide-eyed photographer who takes all the brilliant pictures of JUICE Comedy live events! Having good quality photographs is a HUGE part of making our shows look attractive to people who have never been before. Before Kate came along with her kick-ass camera and mad photography skills, we had Rob Halden taking out-of-focus, grainy and underlit pictures on his crappy camera-phone. The photos that Kate has taken look great on our website, and are a huge part of JUICE reaching out to people through Twitter & Facebook.

Peter Burns a.k.a. ‘Mohawk Pete’ (no one calls him that) is the art & design side of JUICE Comedy. Pete created the great logo we put on everything, and he also designed the JUICE Boxes. The boxes are a fantastic idea, a way for us to dress the set/stage of every comedy night we produce, creating a brand identity and continuity. Pete is also the unseen cameraman in most of the JUICE Videos, meaning that at various times he’s had the enviable job of slapping Rob Halden, jabbing him in the eyes and throwing water in his face.

Storage Space

Being a tiny business all on your own can be tricky. Aside from having nobody else to blame all your mistakes on and shove in front of a bus (a process known as ‘Rebekah-Brooks-ing-The-Staff’…topical, right?) you’ve usually got other issues to deal with. For example; no real estate. We had a meeting set up with a potential client a few months ago, during which they asked if they could come down and visit our offices. We had to fumblingly admit that we have no such building. Since then we’ve tried to come up with a cool-hipster way of saying this to clients. “Yeah, we’re really a  laptop & mobile business. We’re a satellite company. We’re street-punk businessmen. Bricks and mortar can suck it!”

We sound like dicks.

Currently everything to do with JUICE Comedy is stored in Rob Halden’s tiny one-room flat (he calls it a flat, but it’s not. It’s very clearly a bedsit). This includes all paperwork, all posters and all flyers, the giant backing board and wooden sign we use for all the JUICE Videos and the ten wonderful JUICE Boxes that we use to dress all our sets/stages. Now these boxes were a brilliant idea designed by Pete Burns who created them all, they look great when they’re erected (hur-hur) and they are flat-pack so they break down quite well. But they’re still really big and cumbersome and take up a fair bit of room. Despire the boxes being really light, they’re a complete nightmare to move from place to place. Just getting them down a flight of stairs takes two awkward trips.

Recently JUICE has acquired a great big A-board thanks to the generosity of Too Fat Goblinz. Now this could prove to be really useful for advertising/promotion in the future…we’re not entirely sure how just yet, but we’re confident it will. Until that time, it is taking up even more space in Rob Halden’s tiny bedsit.

Sorry, “flat”.

If anyone has any suggestions how we can use our cool new A-board, get in touch and let us know. Aternatively, if you have a place where Rob can sleep then we can continue storing everything in his room.

What It’s All About

We had a great show last night at Joxer Brady’s, it was full of comedians we had never had before at any of our JUICE events.  Some were very new to the world of stand-up comedy and are still finding their feet, others have more experience but have just never had the opportunity to perform for us.  One of the stand-out comedians from last night was Graham Milton, who has some very well-crafted material and excellent delivery.  We look forward to booking him again for future shows.

Perhaps the best moment of the evening came from Mick Crisp.  Mick is a retired gentlemen who came along to a couple of the past New Act/New Material Nights at Joxer Brady’s as an audience member.  Last month he asked if he could have a go at telling jokes, and of course we said yes.  Truth be told, because this was a verbal arrangement and there was no e-mail or text message, we completely forgot that Mick was going to be on the bill last night.  When he realised this, he looked a little disheartened.  Then our compere for the evening, Rob Halden, got the running order mixed-up and announced Mick unexpectedly early (very bad form).

Mick was clearly the oldest performer on the bill, with the rest of the comedians that night being young men.  Mick was visibly nervous, and looked to his wife sat in the audience for a bit of support.  He told us beforehand that he probably only had about five minutes of material.  He introduced himself, started telling jokes and the audience roared.  Some simple, nice little jokes that were all funny.  Mick looked genuinely surprised when the laughter came, and in fact he had already begun to tell the next joke and had to stop to let the audience laugh.  Mick’s face lit up as the audience laughed, and he started delivering his jokes with more confidence and gusto.  By the end of a very short set, he was now waiting for the audience to laugh after telling a joke.

It was a beautiful moment, it was what grass-roots comedy is all about, it was the reason JUICE runs a New Act/New Material Night.  Mick Crip is a funny man.  People have no doubt been telling him this for a while.  His wife probably more than others.  Then Mick plucked up the courage to stand up in front of an audience of young faces on a bill of young faces, told his jokes and made everyone laugh.  It was brilliant.

Afterwards Mick told us that he was so discombobulated that he forgot most of his jokes.  We told him to come back next month and tell them.  He took his wife’s arm and left with a great, big smile on his face.

Long Overdue

Welcome to what should have been started a long time ago, JUICE Comedy’s blog. Somehow, amongst all our efforts in social media with Facebook and Twitter and pictures and videos, we completely forgot to start a blog.  In fact, it wasn’t until a casual conversation with Stafford’s devilishly-talented banjo player Dan Walsh, that the idea even came up.

So now here we are in the eighth year of JUICE Comedy.  What began with two close friends titting about in a pub once a month, has grown and expanded into a small, yet thriving, comedy promotion (albeit one based on titting about).

We’ve got two very exciting shows booked in at the Gatehouse Theatre for later this year, a successful new collaboration in Cocktails & Comedy, and a contract with Screwfix to provide their Stafford social club with some live stand-up comedy in the winter.

In fact, Cocktails & Comedy at Number 15 was such a resounding success in March that we’ve just tenatively agreed dates with the venue for a further three shows this year. Part II already has a fantastic line-up and will be taking place on Saturday 2nd of June, and yesterday we compared diaries with the venue to book in Parts III & IV before the end of 2012.

It’s lovely to work with the guys at Number 15, as they are not only a great local business but also two of the nicest people you could hope to meet.  We’ve not always been so lucky in the past.  In our enthusiasm to promote comedy all over Stafford, we’ve put together a few shows that were probably, in hindsight, best off not taking place.  Hopefully we’re now a bit more cautious about who we work with and what kind of shows we can create.

Number 15 seems to be a perfect fit, and the owners are already discussing ways to improve on the first show.  A slight alteration in the layout of chairs and tables, and, thankfully, creating a type of ‘Green Room’ for the comedians to relax in before and after performing.  For the first Cocktails & Comedy we underestimated how many people would attend.  As literally every single chair and square-inch of space in the building was occupied, the comedians were forced to congregate in Number 15’s little kitchen.  Not one of them complained, but it can’t have helped them get into the right mind-set for performing.  In future we’re hoping to give the comics their own little space away from the crowd where they can sit and prepare.

As all these exciting new opportunities take place, we haven’t forgotten where it all started, the little pub called Joxer Brady’s.  JUICE Comedy is still there each and every month with our New Act/New Material Night. It’s great for us to be able so see so many new comics month in and month out.  In fact, we were so impressed with Ian Crawford last month at Joxer Brady’s that we immediately snapped him up to come and perform at Number 15.

So this Monday night make sure you come down and support grass-roots comedy in your home town.  It’s something that they don’t have in Stone, Cannock, Stoke or Wolverhampton and it’s something Stafford can be proud of.