How Do You Launch A Band Trip?

How Do You Launch A Band Trip?

The school year is rapidly coming to a close, and you may have just returned from a Spring trip with your band. As a result, you may be thinking of where your band should go next Spring and how you can help even more students be a part of it. Here at Green Light, we refer to that as “launching” your next band trip.

“Launching a trip” is when you announce the trip to your group and get everyone interested in registering, paying, and ultimately going on your band’s trip. The more bought in your band is to the idea of travel, the more effective the spring trip will be as a recruiting and retention tool. We recently asked three Green Light trip leaders that’ve had a lot of success launching trips over the years for some insight on how they do it. Everyone’s a little different, but it also turns out there are some consistent best practices- here’s what we found:

Get your school administration bought in

Our three expert trip leaders advised not getting ahead of yourself- before you launch the trip, you have to sell it to the administration of your school. Other than observing this order of operations, they advised making the trip co-curricular. Sell the administration on the musical experiences your students will benefit from as well as any historical sites, museums, and attractions that are relevant to other courses. Students studying WWII in history could visit the Holocaust Museum. Students reading The Outsiders in English could see that show on Broadway. Students learning Spanish could practice the language in Costa Rica. Show the administration how missing a few days of school for the trip will result in tremendous learning opportunities.

A little showmanship goes a long way.

When it’s time to launch the trip to your students and parents, don’t just announce your trip, turn that announcement into an event! Create mystery and intrigue leading up to the reveal of your destination and when you finally do announce it, make it a spectacle. Play music related to the destination. Decorate your classroom in the theme of the trip. Hold a meeting and play one of Green Light’s custom trip videos. And of course, bring the energy! Students will feed off your enthusiasm and the excitement will get them talking. Then, after the trip has been launched don’t just remind your students about it, help them visualize being on the trip:

“In just three months you could be walking out to the middle of a major league baseball stadium, instrument in hand, crowd roaring as you get ready to play the national anthem!”

Don’t be bashful- be loud, proud, and consistently talking up your trip.

After you’ve announced the trip, continue to promote it so it stays front of mind for your students. One of our expert trip leaders uses the morning announcements to promote the trip and has pictures of the trip posted in their room as a daily reminder for their prospective passengers. Any way you can remind students about registering for the trip, our expert trip leaders advise doing it. You simply can’t talk the trip up too much!

Let word of mouth work its magic.

Yes, you as the band director are primarily responsible for promoting the trip, but don’t forget that your students will promote the trip to one another in ways that you never could. Simply light the fire of excitement regarding the trip and let that burn its way through your band on its own. Most students want to know they have a friend going on the trip before they sign up themselves, so a solid group of students registering early on should encourage others to do so as well.

Create a sense of urgency and leverage the fear of missing out

Humans procrastinate by nature. Therefore your students may put off registering for the trip even if they’re excited to go. A way to overcome that is to create a sense of urgency for your students. Our expert trip leaders will point out to their students that there is limited availability and in some cases not everyone will be able to go. Then as the registration window progresses, make announcements to your band, “30 seats left”, “20 seats left”, etc. This motivates students and their families to secure their seats sooner than later to avoid missing out on a great trip that many of their friends will be going on.

A tradition of travel is key

One thing that was unanimous among our expert trip leaders is that a tradition of travel is the most important factor in successfully launching a band trip. A tradition may mean a trip each May that alternates four concepts:

In-state trip
Orlando
Bus trip to a near-by state
NYC or another big-city trip.

You want an incoming freshman to know that their Junior year will be the Orlando trip, so that they can start looking forward to it in 8th grade! It helps with recruiting new students to your band, it gives your existing band members something to look forward to, and when it comes time to launch your trip each year, you’re not fighting an uphill battle, everyone already expects that the trip will happen.

More importantly though, our trip launching experts relayed that maintaining a tradition of travel means keeping the trip going even if you run into obstacles some years. That way your students have faith no matter what, the annual band trip is something they’ll be able to rely on, and that stability will speak volumes to the members of your program.

No matter how you launch your trip- launch it!

In short, we hope this compilation of best practices has inspired you to get more of your students involved in your next band trip. However, we know every program is different and only you know exactly what will work best for yours. Either way, we here at Green Light are excited that you’re launching a student band trip and giving your students the opportunity to expand their horizons as humans through travel.

Now is the time to plan your next band trip! Consider a multitude of other destinations to excite and enrich your performance groups in the upcoming year. Green Light loves to see groups traveling, performing, and reaching their goals, and we’re happy to assist in that process however possible.

Green Light Group Tours is providing this FREE download of tried-and-true tips and suggestions for creating the best travel experience ever! Instant download available HERE. Ready to request a quote for your next band trip? You can do that HERE.

Special thanks to our business partners Green Light Group Tours for this article written by Erik Young. Green Light specializes in exciting and educational travel experiences for your students!