At my library I run a poetry open mic night. I started it in 2007 and it went really well for a long time. We didn't have oodles of people, but we had a good variety every month. This past year has been really rough though, with only 2 or 3 people coming in. And tonight we had no one, not even our one faithful regular who has come every month for the past year and a half.
There could be several reasons for this. The economy may be playing a factor here. People are more concerned about their jobs then about the arts. The library is also undergoing repairs, so there's scaffolding outside and occasional banging, which could be keeping people away. Also, we're downtown. For some reason people do not like to travel downtown unless they absolutely have to, or they're a tourist. But we're out of the way for tourist too because we're not right in the middle of the tourist attractions. *sigh*
I don't know what to do. I don't know whether I should just give it up or try to change something. I hear of poetry programs in other libraries that are really successful and I wonder what their secret is. What are they doing to get people into their programs? What sort of incentive would you need to go to participate in a library open mic?
