[Tango-L] How to make a Wed. night bar milonga successful

[Ming Mar]

Lois Donnay writes:
>What are some of the things that you have seen to make a 
>mid-week milonga better attended?

For over 15 years, the place to tango on Wednesday nights 
in Montreal has been Studio Tango.  It started out as a 
practice night in a converted railroad flat.  It was so 
narrow that the ronda had only one lane going in each 
direction.  There was no center to do crazy things.  There 
was no passing.  Unlike other places, traffic at Studio was 
well behaved.  It became so popular that Studio turned it 
into a milonga.  Later, when they moved to a bigger place, 
their customers followed them.  There are more people at 
Studio's milonga than most of the weekend milongas.

Suggestion 1:  Run an advanced class before the milonga and 
have your students attend the milonga for free.  This way 
the milonga doesn't look empty when the first paying 
customers show up.  (This assumes that your students aren't 
jerks who'll alienate others.)  For some people the tango 
class itself is the pastime and they have no intention to 
go out dancing.  Having a milonga immediately after class 
and free will expose them to the milonga culture.

Suggestion 2a:  If you are the reason people come to the 
milonga, and if you're running another milonga during the 
week, then you're competing against yourself.  Close the 
other milonga.  A friend of mine was the DJ at the most 
popular milonga at the time.  It was on a Sunday.  He also 
had a twice-monthly gig at another milonga (on a Saturday).  
What he noticed was that whenever he worked Saturday, the 
Sunday attendance would drop.  People weren't showing up 
because they liked the floor; they showed up because they 
liked him.  And seeing him once per weekend was enough.  So 
what made him different from other DJs?  He gave everyone a 
warm welcome and he made time for some friendly chitchat.  
During the course of an evening, he'd greet more people 
than anyone else.

Suggestion 2b:  If you are not the reason why people come, 
if you're the ice queen of Minneapolis, then hire a host/
hostess/DJ who is highly extroverted.  Bonus points if you 
steal one from a competitor.

Suggestion 3:  If there's a popular tanguero/tanguera who 
goes to all the milongas, put that person on the guest list 
and have that person tell everyone that on Wednesdays 
he/she goes to Lois's.

Suggestion 4:  Have the DJ ask for requests.  This will 
tell you what your customers like to hear.