For festivals that overlap with Culture Days on September 24-26 participation is easy — all they have to do is register their existing free and participatory activities. But what if your festival’s season does not correspond with Culture Days?

Don’t let this discourage you.  There are lots of ways that festivals can be involved in the movement even off-season. Culture Days is a useful way to remind your audiences of the festival’s contribution to the community all-year round even when your organization is not as visible and active. It can be a good occasion to promote your next festival season. Here are some suggestions:

If Culture Days is 1 to 3 months before your festival season

• Plan to launch your festival catalogue and/or website during Culture Days. Here’s a chance to distribute your festival catalogue to new audiences and to generate some buzz.
• Offer a brief teaser of what is to come. You can whet the audience’s appetite and encourage ticket sales for the festival.
• Put on a “meet and greet” with the local artists who are going to be featured in your festival. Not only is it a chance to showcase the local talent, but it can be very useful for local artists to meet each other and the festival staff before things get really hectic.
• Host a volunteer appreciation session to celebrate the contribution of your committed volunteers and to recruit new volunteers for the up-coming festival.

If Culture Days is more than 4 months before your festival season

• Promote the festival’s call for submissions by hosting a “meet the curator/festival programmer” session. It can be an opportunity to reach out to new artists and tackle some of the typical questions you get about submissions.
• Host a Festival highlights lounge. Show some videos of previous festivals, share stories and invite previous years’ artists to talk about their experiences of the festival.  If you offer an early-bird subscription discount, this is a great time to remind audiences about it.

If your festival season just ended

• Celebrate the festival award winners by offering audiences one last chance to see the “Best in the Fest” or present a panel discussion by the winners.

Finally, it’s not necessary to put on a big show in your off-season to be part of the Culture Days movement. Activities can be low-maintenance and low-stress events that simply welcome the public into your world and sparks dialogue and exhange. Please post comments if you think of other ways festivals can participate.