I watched Mike Mont.'s video of helping the local scene and I want to start a yo-yo club. The thing is, I don’t know how to approach this. Should I make it a school thing or a local thing because I don’t want to just limit this enjoyable thing to just High Schoolers.
There is also a problem of venue, advertising, and funds. I need some advice.
Talk to your school or somewhere you go that has a gym or big meeting area to meet at. Most likely, with adult supervision, they’ll let you use it. For getting yoyos for people, just have them get one from a local store; hopefully at least Toys R Us has some they can get.
Chris,
To start a club at your local school, you will need a faculty member to sponsor you. All that means is that you need a teacher to be there for the club meetings and set up a place for you to meet. If you dont know of any teachers who are interested in yoyos, then find a club that is already active but not huge, for example a chess club, an anime club, or a Jamaican bobsled team, or whatever. Something along those lines. Find out who the teacher is who is responsible for that club and ask if you can tag on your yoyo club to theirs, to attract more attention to both clubs. For example when I started the yoyo club at the school where I teach, the teacher in charge of the chess club wanted us to meet at the same time and place (cafeteria after school on Tuesdays) to draw more attention to chess club. It was a good time and place, and it would have been perfect if I were a student looking for a venue. you might need a permission slip to give out to students depending on the school. I can email you the one I prepared if you’d like, pm me.
If you can’t find a teacher or existing club willing to sponsor you, try going to your local library. They have rooms available for free or for a small fee for clubs just like this one. Ask the head librarian if he/she can help you get this club started, if the librarian is nice, it’s likely that they will do a lot of the work for you, if not, they will at least tell you where space is available, and what you need to do to get it. You can try the same thing at a local YMCA or rec center.
More important than a venue is to get people to show up. Talk to everyone you know who likes to yoyo, see when they are available. When you have a time and place lined up, two weeks before you meet for the first time start telling everyone you know about it. Even print off a flyer. Get your friends to do the same. Just make sure the word gets out. Yoyo everywhere you go. When someone comments about it, tell them about the club. Contact professional yoyo demonstrators in your area to come to the meeting if at all possible. You can do this by emailing the different companies like Duncan, yyj, yyf, hspin, etc about reps in the area.
Since it’s almost summer, you can even plan to meet at a local park. This might be a good option if you can’t find a venue elsewhere, and you can continue to look for a venue throughout the summer.
Let me know if I can help with anything else.
Thanks Dan,
Alright here’s the problem:
I live in a small town where I’m practically the only yo-yoer there. Our local toy store is Toys R’ Us and it’s a half an hour drive there. The only yo-yos they sell are Freehand 2’s, Dragonflies, and Speed Beetles. We have a local Hobby Shop that sells outdated, overpriced Yomega yo-yos.
The thing is people do ask me about this and ask the usual “how do you do this” and the “I can’t even bring it up and down.” Their interest only reach that extent and I have not gotten any people asking “Can you teach me that stuff.”
To add insult to injury, my school is mostly made of people who think the stuff they do is better than what anyone else does and they actually convince otherwise. Our school can’t have clubs after school, only during lunch and nobody wants to waste their lunch coming to this thing.
Our only means of advertising is the school announcements and hanging posters will result someone ripping them off. Unless I can find a good way to advertise, I won’t get the word out that well.
Finally, the most important thing is: I don’t want to just limit this club to my school. I want children in my town to experience this life-changing hobby that will give them something else to think about besides video games and riding Death Hill without a helmet :p. I want it to be a local thing and I don’t think we have any pros here (Unless Duncan Crew end up stopping in the Toys R’ Us in Modesto).
That’s the worst of my problems and it’s a pain in the rear-end.
I started a yoyo club in Tehachapi (its a third the size of Oakdale). A good place to meet is a park, or similar public place , because its easy to find, free, and people feel less intimidated. As for getting people interested, just go walk around town yoyoing and talk to anyone willing to stop and watch.
Hope this helps ;D
keep it local so that people won’t have to travel halfway across the world to meet you, and i suggest asking for donations online or in your neighborhood for funding. ;D
ok, I see your plight. Take it slow. Find somebody that is remotely interested in what you do with yoyos and take him/her under your wing. Teach them what you know, including this incredible website with it’s vastresource library of tutorials and forum knowledge. dont do this all at once though. Like I said, take it slow. when someone asks how you do this or that, show or tell them of a youtube video or something to really get them interested. tell them of the wonderful assortment of yoyos available at the toys r us near you (better than nothing). Work from there. One throwling with turn into two and three, and eventually your will have a half dozen people who want to meet regularly maybe at the park or something. It’s not hard, It just takes patience. May the yo be with you.
ps. Where abouts do you live?
I’ve taken you know about Oakdale or maybe the Modesto area in California. If you live in Cal then I live in the central valley.
You guys make me want to join a yoyo club now :(. That would be pretty sweet. Would be nice to start one my self but sadly I don’t think it would be worth it for me cause I am kinda new at it.
But yea trying to get people from Duncan, yoyojam or whatever would gain tons of publicity (I assume).
Get Andre!!! Maybe he will do it!
and with the yoyo club you can have like little “yoyo recitals” I don’t exactly know what the right term is but maybe mini competiions to see what you accomplished!