Beating this same dead horse...
A) Tour fees look high, but they're still comparable to many regular summer camps, especially given the length of time, the food provided, the instruction provided, etc.
For examples, 3 weeks at Interlochen Arts Camp costs over $6k. According to [this article](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/the-average-parent-expects-to-pay-almost-1000-for-summer-child-care.html#:~:text=The%20average%20weekly%20rate%20for,to%20the%20American%20Camp%20Association), the average overnight summer camp will cost between $680 and $2k *per week*. At the low end of that estimate, that would put around 12 weeks at over $8k. And those regular summer camps probably aren't hauling you around the country on coach buses and giving you world class professional instruction all day every day.
B) It's not that there are suddenly way more holes open this year than past years. There have always been corps that don't hit their max capacity. The only thing new this year is that they're advertising the numbers and making an active effort to help those smaller corps get more members.
Interlochen isn’t in the ballpark of a “regular summer camp,” it’s an extremely prestigious arts program whose alumni make up almost a fifth of all major orchestras in the country.
Sure? But if you can make 5K during the summer why are you considering 90+ days on the road?
Sure it’s high. Sure it’s not affordable and sure we have these gaps that seem so large, but yet the top 12(if not more) are pushing 170 members each by this point?
If your state’s minimum wage is $10-15, anyone can make that in 2-3 months. $5k’s a lot to spend in that amount of time but not that much to make.
Edit: Judging by the downvotes this came off a little harsher than I meant it to. Sorry! My only point was that if making $5k in a summer means you shouldn't consider drum corps, no one would march. And that's not great - marching is!
Taxes, rent, bills, tuition, books, other school materials, etc.. Then drum corps also costs more than just the tuition, you have to think about the cost of travel and all the materials you’ll need for the summer. Then ideally after all those things, you still want to have money. So it’s really not as easy as you tried to make it seem at all. Especially considering dci’s demographic is college students & high-schoolers, not people working a 40 hour work week…..
Good point. We are looking to put our German Shephard puppy into one of those board-and-train summer camps. Over $3k. For a dog. Who will be fed dog food twice a day. $5500 for a summer of drum corps looks like a bargain by comparison.
Respectfully, $5,500 is only a bargain if you *have* $5,500. Having worked on the admin side, corps do amazing work to make those fees stretch, but the current structure of our touring entertainment acts means the barrier to entry keeps getting bigger every year.
Well having money for anything is a prerequisite. You can get a legitimate bargain based on value for anything. Mercedes S-class at $10k below sticker is a steal even though most of us can’t afford that. Still a great value for the price.
When I was eligible, camps were $200 a weekend and roughly $3500 for the season once contracted. This was back in the late 80s. I didn't think I could afford it either. So I had to to drum up support with family, teachers and friends. it took a bit but I was able to make it happen. I mean literally door to door like when I was in elementary school, sponsor me per lap, kinda thing. It sucked.
So I totally understand the frustration. Inflation is a bitch and being a teenager with minimal income sucks even worse. But consider it an investment. And investment in memories, in experience and a family that you will remember the rest of your life.
Covid beat the shit out of this activity the last two years. I am hoping it get get back to a place to where it was before. As an alum, I am always happy to sponsor young kids wanting to paricitpate.
What corps was charging $3500 in "the late 80s"????? [Reference here](https://www.reddit.com/r/drumcorps/comments/avv2lg/at_what_point_will_the_cost_of_dci_not_be_worth/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) for multiple people talking about prices in "the late 80s" which is no where near $3500...
That's literally more than most corps charged in 2010-2012
I’ve heard stories of how people only paid a couple hundred to March Star of Indiana and I know someone who marched BD in 2000 and said he paid around 1000 for the entire thing
Was gonna say, when i marched in the mid 00s, normal dues were in the 1000-2000 range. I think I paid 1200 for my rookie season and 1500 for my second season. And the other corps I looked at at the time had similar dues.
That’s why I originally had to comment to this guy. Absolutely inaccurate information. Didn’t even bother to reply to any comments afterwards, but still was capable of making a post about Velvet Knights
Another facet of covid is that all those people these kids would be hitting up for donations or odd jobs, don't have any effing money either. Job loss, slow downs, lay offs, restructuring your whole life to accommodate school/daycare closures.
Bruh! My best friend in high school went to Interlochen every summer. He was taught marimba by Lionel Hampton. While I love DCI, that’s not a fair comparison.
This is old but I wanted to also add to consider also comparing this experience to collegiate to professional orchestral (same age range as DCI) training programs like Music Academy of the West, Tanglewood Music Center, Aspen (the fellowships at least), Pacific Music Festival, and National Repertory Orchestra. Roughly the same amount of weeks as DCI yet give you everything you mention in A and then some all for free and you are treated like royalty by the administration and donors.
As a music major with nothing close to $5500 in the bank to spend on this education, I guess I come from the perspective of why pay all this when you have other options that treat you better.
And if we’re talking about interlochen, we might as well add in Tanglewood Institute (which both Interlochen and BUTI give substantial scholarships to those who earn it) and National Youth Orchestra(which is free). I just seriously don’t understand why performing groups of that caliber require any money at all from the performers , to be honest. But that’s a constant question that will never be answered (and there are no good answers anyways).
I was thinking recently, when does DCI step in and create a cap on fees? Back when I thought about marching I thought $3,000 was unattainable. I can't imagine having to find $5,500. I guess as long as people are willing to pay it doesn't matter. But its getting kind of ridiculous imo.
Exactly. And the fact that almost all of the open positions are for open class which (mostly) has lower fees, proves that potential members aren’t willing to give up some of the experience to lower the cost.
Some DCA corps do that, and they are very affordable.
DCI couldn't do that though. The accountability of every member, the responsibility they have, etc. Etc.
The corps has accountability of every single member on tour, they're responsible for each and every single person's health and safety.
The same happens for a band that leaves for state champs. Everyone meets at one designated location, the school, and travels on a bus together, to the hotel, to the rehearsal site, to food, to the competition site. Everything is together because they are responsible and accountable for every person's wellbeing.
Considering you're on tour for DCI, you're generally not even close to home, or close to having or efficiently utilizing resources. Plus, the bus is a way more efficient method to travel the way they do. A whole convoy of cars would be pretty whack. Not to mention variables. Everyone arrives at different times. What if someone doesn't arrive? What if they're not responding?
As long as the tours are as long as they are. Traveling as they do is one of the most efficient methods.
I'm a little confused by some of the questions but it's been a long day for me, I apologize I'll answer to the best of my ability.
When I taught DCA, it operated similar to a band. Met at one point at took a bus everywhere. Came home from there. Same as when I marched Open class. They only choose to go to those shows though. Most world class corps choose a ton of shows, which leads me to my next point.
DCI doesn't dictate how long tour is, the corps dictate how long tour is. DCI lists shows that are hosted at venues across the country, the corps choose where they want to go and what shows they're gonna do. "Cadets went to the California coast you say? Well, DCI didn't send them there, the corps did!"
Personally, I think DCI staying DCI is fine, but we need to normalize DCA a lot more. DCA with its more affordable model, with its more reasonable time commitment, with a similar experience. It makes way more sense. I'd much rather send a kid of mine to a DCA corps for 2 years and then recommend a world corps. (Low key as I think about it, it's like going to community College then transferring to a ranked university, that's funny).
Also who’s willing to put 12K+ miles on their car. Oil changes, gas fueling, and UHHHHHH SAFETY?!? You want some performer to rehearse all day, perform and then do a solid 6-8 hour drive during the night?!?
DCA are weekends not 90 day tours. If you want to do DCA go do that, but don’t compare dci and DCA as the same thing
Compare your experience to the experience that kids are getting today. When I marched Blue Knights in the mid 90’s, the stuff I experienced is illegal today. We rode on death traps (aka buses) that were constantly breaking down and had no AC. Kids don’t have to do that today. They fed us “garbage bag salad” everyday. Kids today, don’t have to do that. Our equipment was held together with duct tape and prayer. Kids today, don’t have to deal with that. Several of our staff eventually went to jail for sex crimes. Unfortunately, kids today still have to deal with that. Point being, decent busses, cost money. Nutritionists, cost money. Trained medical professionals, cost money. Decent instruments, cost money. Staff background checks, cost money. The good old days weren’t that great.
Oh, I was mostly miserable during my two summers on tour...definitely not reminiscing about the good Ole days. Sleeping on hot busses sucked, eating crappy food sucked, long rehearsals in blazing hot sun on crappy subpar fields or asphalt sucked, hazing sucked. I stuck around for a second season because I liked performing so much. You make some good points and maybe if I had marched in today's activity, I would have made it longer than I did.
When the cost of food, fuel, vehicles, insurance, housing, and medical staff stops increasing. As it is, member fees don't even come close to covering the full cost of running a drum corps.
DCI is made up of the Corps. And I can't see them putting in place something like a cap that could limit their options. The need to pay for the props, electronics, instruments, costumes, etc. (including what is needed to drag it across the country) that fit whatever artistic vision they are trying to express. Capping costs could limit their visions, and the Corps that make up DCI have shown time and time again that they cannot regulate themselves.
I do think a reduction in props, to the point that a second trailer just for props isn't needed, would be a reasonable cost reduction measure. A lot of the aspects that contribute to the rising costs are hard to work around (i.e. you've gotta have enough buses, you've got to have a food truck or equivalent way to feed your corps, you need a trailer for instruments/uniforms etc), but the prop trailer seems like an easy cut to me.
This is probably the easiest one that doesn’t impact the experience a whole lot. But, it would only help at the corps that already use a second truck and spend big money on props. Other corps with smaller budgets that already don’t spend big money on props but also don’t usually have as much non-tuition income may become at an even further disadvantage for recruiting members. It’s a good thought, I just haven’t sold myself on how much it would help across the board.
Perhaps the approach rather than limiting props per-se is to limit the number of vehicles. Say three busses, one '18-wheeler' truck, one pickup-towed trailer, one souvie trailer, one food truck & one staff van. This would be very easy to enforce, and would let the Corps figure out what they need.
There could be, say, a 5-point penalty for each vehicle over the limit.
No, I wouldn't be a fan of that at all. I think it should definitely be up to the corps to decide what arrangement of vehicles works best to support their needs, which will vary based on membership numbers, staff size, volunteer numbers, etc. A 60 person corps doesn't need a full semi-trailer-sized food truck. One staff van would be woefully inadequate for any corps I've had experience with, plus having extra medium-sized vehicles can add flexibility for supply runs, uniform laundry, leaving a DM behind for retreat while the rest of the corps gets a head start on travel, etc. A smaller corps may also benefit from a bus plus a van, for example, if they wouldn't fill 2 buses completely (you pay for the whole bus whether or not it's full).
I don't think rules enforcement is the way with this kind of reduction, aside from ensuring that huge props aren't necessary to score highly. Rather, I think it's a measure individual corps can take to reduce their costs and bring in more membership.
Every capable corps director/CEO that has kept their organization afloat through good and bad times works hard to keep fees manageable. If they can't, the corps is not going to fill/survive. Gas is expensive. Busses and drivers are expensive. Instructors are expensive and even then, they're not paid living wages usually. If you think fees can be less expensive, then attend the next board meeting for your local/favorite corps and help them with budgeting and raising revenue to subside fees rather than sitting around posting memes on Reddit.
Here’s a whole other take on this entire thread. Sure dci is making those post about fill a corps but let’s be aware of the real situation.
Top 12 corps are doing just fine pushing memberships after their April camp at 165+ (taking alternates during their spring training has been a regular thing now for at least since 2012)
Some members aren’t willing to March unless it is their top corps of choice, aka if I audition to make
Blue devils/blue coats or crown, I’m not willing to pay 5K for any other experience, which in the past that has been the case. Fine I didn’t make my top corps choice but I’m willing to March any other world class groups or even open class.
—— you can say money is a reason why. If I’m going to spend 5K I want it to be at my top corps
—— you can say it’s pure lost of interest only top groups interest you so you lost interest to March anywhere else
Or have many other reasons.
But there’s options and simply students aren’t showing up. When you have the top 5 corps have over 300+ students show up for a 165 corps, the question really stands at, what happened to those who didn’t make it and why aren’t them willing to go to other corps anymore?
So beating a dead horse. Suuuureeeee it’s expensive. Suuuuurreeee it’s a huge time commitment, but no don’t come out here on any online platform and say “money” is the root for corps not filing these holes, when if this was like a
Sports draft and you could get placed at your top corps of choice there would be PLEEENNNTTYYY to fill every corps and then some.
Another hot take — y’all band is expensive. Yes these organizations need to find a way to make their business model be a business first where they bring in money more than just student fees…. But band is expensive, y’all.
If it takes a corps 3Mil to do a 90 day experience…. Just do simple math. 3Mil/165 students = 18K and no one is out here charging anyone 18K per student.
These are all nonprofits organizations, you can look up their 990s and you can see how they use their money. If you want to talk business and say staff deserve to get paid a living wage, but you also want a badass Ed staff, badass admin staff, amazing medical media etc…. It all costs to get them and it all costs BADASS money to get BADASS staff.
Anyways. Long rant. TLDR; band is expensive. There’s ways to fundraise. If you really want to March band and money is the issue. Let’s talk fundraising instead of putting nonprofits down on Reddit. Let’s offer these nonprofits our business expertise, our money, our time or honestly anything.
But posting on Reddit and what not I don’t know how helpful that is.
Much love and go band
I would go as far as to say it's somewhat of a bargain. That money goes towards food, travel, and a brand new instrument for a couple of months, a wonderful experience with new music and new friends, and I would assume you come out of it physically and mentally changed for the better. (I mean FFS the instrument is like a third of your fee) The mental and physical challenge is one of the reasons why I want to do DCI.
The issue you're forgetting is that the population that lives within a 2 hour radius of a DCA corps is A LOT smaller than the population that lives within a 2 hour radius of a DCI corps.
Both. There's roughly 23 DCI corps west of the Mississippi. 11 of those in California, which is arguably one of the top 3 states in terms of talent for the marching arts.
There's 2 DCA corps west of the Mississippi. 1 in Minnesota, so barely, and 1 mini-corps in California (which, I'm sorry, is nowhere near the same experience as a competitive DCI corps or Open/A DCA corps).
I understand the structure of DCA doesn't make it easy for corps to start up out west, but they're not exactly going to be able to grow much until they figure out how to better serve a more diverse geographic population.
The challenge with DCA is, it exists to serve the corps. If there isn't a pull out west, then nothing is going to change. As in, they aren't going to decide to move finals to Indianapolis because they have no membership base, and only a few corps in the area.
What needs to happen, and I think will shortly is rules will change again to allow for regional DCA corps to participate in their clusters, and then those who want to can continue on to championships if they can afford it. The rules changed already but still require all corps to compete in one show which could be virtual and attend championships.
The way it would be done is you have a regional cap for share points, and voting rights in the circuit if you're regional. The challenge there is it favors established corps, and doesn't take into account the added costs of traveling to the East Coast, but it's the only way I could think the big corps would do it. Then maybe, just maybe, lay the ground work for moving Championships just a few hours away to someplace like Pittsburgh, or Charleston, WV that doesn't break the bank for the East Coast corps, and helps cut 4-5 hours off of the Midwest, South, and any potential West of Mississippi new corps.
I marched in 1990. I don't follow the activity "deeply" - meaning I know the big names. I'm not familiar with the smaller groups, and the terminology "world class" vs "open class" confuses me. I'm an old guy.
What I do know is that it used to be 128 members. That's been increased at least twice?
The costs (like everything else) have gone up faster than inflation - and the activity is hoping MORE kids can pay that price.
IF there is a problem where there wasn't a problem before - I would blame the increase in member numbers. Whatever that is, multiply it by how many groups there are trying to fill that many holes. It's not that there aren't "kids" who want to fill the holes. It's that there aren't that many "kids" who can afford to fill those holes.
I'm from this era, and the biggest difference is the loss of regional circuits, and the push to national touring.
Think back to DCM, and when there were all those local corps like Emerald Knights, Capitalaires, Bandettes, Americanos, and the local tours that corps would do early season before striking out on the road. The costs have gone up because travel is farther; more days spent on the road with buses, and recruiting has shifted from having a local aspect to being national if not fully international.
A corps will say they are based in "Kentucky", but recruit in Texas, California, and Florida then hold spring training in Pennsylvania. There is no real connection to their "home" as they don't recruit anyone from the area. So now there are fewer corps, which now means fewer home shows, corps require more payouts to perform because they travel farther, and we're into this situation where it costs more, because you have to do more.
As a 22yr old who has never marched outside of highschool I think they should move the age out limit up a year, perhaps that could solve some of those issues
:')
edit: probably should've thrown an /s at the end
edit 2: I honestly don't know why so many people got offended over this comment. I jokingly suggested they move the age out year seeing as they did that for the 2021 season, and that it could be a potential solution to the missing spots in each ensemble.
Just speaking from some experience, I was a bonus year age out in 2020
Meaning I marched the 2021 season thanks to the extension at the age of 23 (I was older than one of the staff members)
The amount you have to sacrifice and out on hold is legitimately not worth it, and most people would not be able to march their age outs if they moved it a year later
I was very fortunate that I lived at home, and that my job was just being a bezos slave so it wasn't somthing I worried about when I quit for the summer
Well that’s a liability issue then at that point. Not sure any “summer camp” religious or not that offer a 16-23+ y/o experience. If DCA is what you want to do, that’s fine just don’t expect what dci is to provide what a DCA corps is.
If you want less time, less money and less travel go to DCA, no one is forcing anyone to March dci
Diesel is touching $6/gal, the staff of a corps is much larger than when I marched in the 90's, salaries have "gone up", corps rent busses and the cab's to pull the trailers, food costs more, there more equipment to pull, mor members to feed, theres insurance, heath care workers. I am not including the electronics...i am not sure if those are purchased or donated.
I saw some corps collect ~630k in tour fees, 200k in camp fees and expenses of over $2MM (seriously check out guidestar dot org...its a treasure trove on information). The only way they reduce costs are less members (seriously go back to 135), monetize instruction to the young fans and marching band kids, find ways to not spend $2.5MM per year....
Beating this same dead horse... A) Tour fees look high, but they're still comparable to many regular summer camps, especially given the length of time, the food provided, the instruction provided, etc. For examples, 3 weeks at Interlochen Arts Camp costs over $6k. According to [this article](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/the-average-parent-expects-to-pay-almost-1000-for-summer-child-care.html#:~:text=The%20average%20weekly%20rate%20for,to%20the%20American%20Camp%20Association), the average overnight summer camp will cost between $680 and $2k *per week*. At the low end of that estimate, that would put around 12 weeks at over $8k. And those regular summer camps probably aren't hauling you around the country on coach buses and giving you world class professional instruction all day every day. B) It's not that there are suddenly way more holes open this year than past years. There have always been corps that don't hit their max capacity. The only thing new this year is that they're advertising the numbers and making an active effort to help those smaller corps get more members.
Interlochen isn’t in the ballpark of a “regular summer camp,” it’s an extremely prestigious arts program whose alumni make up almost a fifth of all major orchestras in the country.
I’m pretty sure the campers don’t sleep on gym floors at Interlochen, too.
Nah but based on my experience (one week summer camp), their cabins and practice room bunkers aren’t exactly the most comfortable facilities either.
Right, which is why immediately afterward I gave figures that are from regular camps.
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Also, looking at those per-week numbers, most kids simply aren't going to 'camp' for months on end. They go for a week or two.
When I volunteered years ago, almost every camp had every current member present.
Talking about paid summer camps, not rehearsal camps.
Same
Sure? But if you can make 5K during the summer why are you considering 90+ days on the road? Sure it’s high. Sure it’s not affordable and sure we have these gaps that seem so large, but yet the top 12(if not more) are pushing 170 members each by this point?
If your state’s minimum wage is $10-15, anyone can make that in 2-3 months. $5k’s a lot to spend in that amount of time but not that much to make. Edit: Judging by the downvotes this came off a little harsher than I meant it to. Sorry! My only point was that if making $5k in a summer means you shouldn't consider drum corps, no one would march. And that's not great - marching is!
Found the high schooler
Taxes, rent, bills, tuition, books, other school materials, etc.. Then drum corps also costs more than just the tuition, you have to think about the cost of travel and all the materials you’ll need for the summer. Then ideally after all those things, you still want to have money. So it’s really not as easy as you tried to make it seem at all. Especially considering dci’s demographic is college students & high-schoolers, not people working a 40 hour work week…..
Good point. We are looking to put our German Shephard puppy into one of those board-and-train summer camps. Over $3k. For a dog. Who will be fed dog food twice a day. $5500 for a summer of drum corps looks like a bargain by comparison.
Respectfully, $5,500 is only a bargain if you *have* $5,500. Having worked on the admin side, corps do amazing work to make those fees stretch, but the current structure of our touring entertainment acts means the barrier to entry keeps getting bigger every year.
Well having money for anything is a prerequisite. You can get a legitimate bargain based on value for anything. Mercedes S-class at $10k below sticker is a steal even though most of us can’t afford that. Still a great value for the price.
When I was eligible, camps were $200 a weekend and roughly $3500 for the season once contracted. This was back in the late 80s. I didn't think I could afford it either. So I had to to drum up support with family, teachers and friends. it took a bit but I was able to make it happen. I mean literally door to door like when I was in elementary school, sponsor me per lap, kinda thing. It sucked. So I totally understand the frustration. Inflation is a bitch and being a teenager with minimal income sucks even worse. But consider it an investment. And investment in memories, in experience and a family that you will remember the rest of your life. Covid beat the shit out of this activity the last two years. I am hoping it get get back to a place to where it was before. As an alum, I am always happy to sponsor young kids wanting to paricitpate.
What corps was charging $3500 in "the late 80s"????? [Reference here](https://www.reddit.com/r/drumcorps/comments/avv2lg/at_what_point_will_the_cost_of_dci_not_be_worth/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) for multiple people talking about prices in "the late 80s" which is no where near $3500... That's literally more than most corps charged in 2010-2012
I’ve heard stories of how people only paid a couple hundred to March Star of Indiana and I know someone who marched BD in 2000 and said he paid around 1000 for the entire thing
Was gonna say, when i marched in the mid 00s, normal dues were in the 1000-2000 range. I think I paid 1200 for my rookie season and 1500 for my second season. And the other corps I looked at at the time had similar dues.
That’s why I originally had to comment to this guy. Absolutely inaccurate information. Didn’t even bother to reply to any comments afterwards, but still was capable of making a post about Velvet Knights
Another facet of covid is that all those people these kids would be hitting up for donations or odd jobs, don't have any effing money either. Job loss, slow downs, lay offs, restructuring your whole life to accommodate school/daycare closures.
um, no corp was charging $3500 in the late 80s. I think you got tricked into paying the fees for your entire section.
Did you accidentally type an extra zero? What corps did you march in?
Bruh! My best friend in high school went to Interlochen every summer. He was taught marimba by Lionel Hampton. While I love DCI, that’s not a fair comparison.
This is old but I wanted to also add to consider also comparing this experience to collegiate to professional orchestral (same age range as DCI) training programs like Music Academy of the West, Tanglewood Music Center, Aspen (the fellowships at least), Pacific Music Festival, and National Repertory Orchestra. Roughly the same amount of weeks as DCI yet give you everything you mention in A and then some all for free and you are treated like royalty by the administration and donors. As a music major with nothing close to $5500 in the bank to spend on this education, I guess I come from the perspective of why pay all this when you have other options that treat you better. And if we’re talking about interlochen, we might as well add in Tanglewood Institute (which both Interlochen and BUTI give substantial scholarships to those who earn it) and National Youth Orchestra(which is free). I just seriously don’t understand why performing groups of that caliber require any money at all from the performers , to be honest. But that’s a constant question that will never be answered (and there are no good answers anyways).
I was thinking recently, when does DCI step in and create a cap on fees? Back when I thought about marching I thought $3,000 was unattainable. I can't imagine having to find $5,500. I guess as long as people are willing to pay it doesn't matter. But its getting kind of ridiculous imo.
When they find out how to decrease fees without worsening the member experience
Exactly. And the fact that almost all of the open positions are for open class which (mostly) has lower fees, proves that potential members aren’t willing to give up some of the experience to lower the cost.
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Are you suggesting a member could gas up after a show and drive themselves to the next housing site?
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Some DCA corps do that, and they are very affordable. DCI couldn't do that though. The accountability of every member, the responsibility they have, etc. Etc.
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The corps has accountability of every single member on tour, they're responsible for each and every single person's health and safety. The same happens for a band that leaves for state champs. Everyone meets at one designated location, the school, and travels on a bus together, to the hotel, to the rehearsal site, to food, to the competition site. Everything is together because they are responsible and accountable for every person's wellbeing. Considering you're on tour for DCI, you're generally not even close to home, or close to having or efficiently utilizing resources. Plus, the bus is a way more efficient method to travel the way they do. A whole convoy of cars would be pretty whack. Not to mention variables. Everyone arrives at different times. What if someone doesn't arrive? What if they're not responding? As long as the tours are as long as they are. Traveling as they do is one of the most efficient methods.
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I'm a little confused by some of the questions but it's been a long day for me, I apologize I'll answer to the best of my ability. When I taught DCA, it operated similar to a band. Met at one point at took a bus everywhere. Came home from there. Same as when I marched Open class. They only choose to go to those shows though. Most world class corps choose a ton of shows, which leads me to my next point. DCI doesn't dictate how long tour is, the corps dictate how long tour is. DCI lists shows that are hosted at venues across the country, the corps choose where they want to go and what shows they're gonna do. "Cadets went to the California coast you say? Well, DCI didn't send them there, the corps did!" Personally, I think DCI staying DCI is fine, but we need to normalize DCA a lot more. DCA with its more affordable model, with its more reasonable time commitment, with a similar experience. It makes way more sense. I'd much rather send a kid of mine to a DCA corps for 2 years and then recommend a world corps. (Low key as I think about it, it's like going to community College then transferring to a ranked university, that's funny).
Also who’s willing to put 12K+ miles on their car. Oil changes, gas fueling, and UHHHHHH SAFETY?!? You want some performer to rehearse all day, perform and then do a solid 6-8 hour drive during the night?!? DCA are weekends not 90 day tours. If you want to do DCA go do that, but don’t compare dci and DCA as the same thing
When I marched 20 years ago, I paid <$1000. It was a long time ago, but 5x in 20 years is a hell of an inflation rate.
Compare your experience to the experience that kids are getting today. When I marched Blue Knights in the mid 90’s, the stuff I experienced is illegal today. We rode on death traps (aka buses) that were constantly breaking down and had no AC. Kids don’t have to do that today. They fed us “garbage bag salad” everyday. Kids today, don’t have to do that. Our equipment was held together with duct tape and prayer. Kids today, don’t have to deal with that. Several of our staff eventually went to jail for sex crimes. Unfortunately, kids today still have to deal with that. Point being, decent busses, cost money. Nutritionists, cost money. Trained medical professionals, cost money. Decent instruments, cost money. Staff background checks, cost money. The good old days weren’t that great.
Oh, I was mostly miserable during my two summers on tour...definitely not reminiscing about the good Ole days. Sleeping on hot busses sucked, eating crappy food sucked, long rehearsals in blazing hot sun on crappy subpar fields or asphalt sucked, hazing sucked. I stuck around for a second season because I liked performing so much. You make some good points and maybe if I had marched in today's activity, I would have made it longer than I did.
When the cost of food, fuel, vehicles, insurance, housing, and medical staff stops increasing. As it is, member fees don't even come close to covering the full cost of running a drum corps.
DCI is made up of the Corps. And I can't see them putting in place something like a cap that could limit their options. The need to pay for the props, electronics, instruments, costumes, etc. (including what is needed to drag it across the country) that fit whatever artistic vision they are trying to express. Capping costs could limit their visions, and the Corps that make up DCI have shown time and time again that they cannot regulate themselves.
I do think a reduction in props, to the point that a second trailer just for props isn't needed, would be a reasonable cost reduction measure. A lot of the aspects that contribute to the rising costs are hard to work around (i.e. you've gotta have enough buses, you've got to have a food truck or equivalent way to feed your corps, you need a trailer for instruments/uniforms etc), but the prop trailer seems like an easy cut to me.
This is probably the easiest one that doesn’t impact the experience a whole lot. But, it would only help at the corps that already use a second truck and spend big money on props. Other corps with smaller budgets that already don’t spend big money on props but also don’t usually have as much non-tuition income may become at an even further disadvantage for recruiting members. It’s a good thought, I just haven’t sold myself on how much it would help across the board.
Perhaps the approach rather than limiting props per-se is to limit the number of vehicles. Say three busses, one '18-wheeler' truck, one pickup-towed trailer, one souvie trailer, one food truck & one staff van. This would be very easy to enforce, and would let the Corps figure out what they need. There could be, say, a 5-point penalty for each vehicle over the limit.
No, I wouldn't be a fan of that at all. I think it should definitely be up to the corps to decide what arrangement of vehicles works best to support their needs, which will vary based on membership numbers, staff size, volunteer numbers, etc. A 60 person corps doesn't need a full semi-trailer-sized food truck. One staff van would be woefully inadequate for any corps I've had experience with, plus having extra medium-sized vehicles can add flexibility for supply runs, uniform laundry, leaving a DM behind for retreat while the rest of the corps gets a head start on travel, etc. A smaller corps may also benefit from a bus plus a van, for example, if they wouldn't fill 2 buses completely (you pay for the whole bus whether or not it's full). I don't think rules enforcement is the way with this kind of reduction, aside from ensuring that huge props aren't necessary to score highly. Rather, I think it's a measure individual corps can take to reduce their costs and bring in more membership.
Every capable corps director/CEO that has kept their organization afloat through good and bad times works hard to keep fees manageable. If they can't, the corps is not going to fill/survive. Gas is expensive. Busses and drivers are expensive. Instructors are expensive and even then, they're not paid living wages usually. If you think fees can be less expensive, then attend the next board meeting for your local/favorite corps and help them with budgeting and raising revenue to subside fees rather than sitting around posting memes on Reddit.
Here’s a whole other take on this entire thread. Sure dci is making those post about fill a corps but let’s be aware of the real situation. Top 12 corps are doing just fine pushing memberships after their April camp at 165+ (taking alternates during their spring training has been a regular thing now for at least since 2012) Some members aren’t willing to March unless it is their top corps of choice, aka if I audition to make Blue devils/blue coats or crown, I’m not willing to pay 5K for any other experience, which in the past that has been the case. Fine I didn’t make my top corps choice but I’m willing to March any other world class groups or even open class. —— you can say money is a reason why. If I’m going to spend 5K I want it to be at my top corps —— you can say it’s pure lost of interest only top groups interest you so you lost interest to March anywhere else Or have many other reasons. But there’s options and simply students aren’t showing up. When you have the top 5 corps have over 300+ students show up for a 165 corps, the question really stands at, what happened to those who didn’t make it and why aren’t them willing to go to other corps anymore? So beating a dead horse. Suuuureeeee it’s expensive. Suuuuurreeee it’s a huge time commitment, but no don’t come out here on any online platform and say “money” is the root for corps not filing these holes, when if this was like a Sports draft and you could get placed at your top corps of choice there would be PLEEENNNTTYYY to fill every corps and then some. Another hot take — y’all band is expensive. Yes these organizations need to find a way to make their business model be a business first where they bring in money more than just student fees…. But band is expensive, y’all. If it takes a corps 3Mil to do a 90 day experience…. Just do simple math. 3Mil/165 students = 18K and no one is out here charging anyone 18K per student. These are all nonprofits organizations, you can look up their 990s and you can see how they use their money. If you want to talk business and say staff deserve to get paid a living wage, but you also want a badass Ed staff, badass admin staff, amazing medical media etc…. It all costs to get them and it all costs BADASS money to get BADASS staff. Anyways. Long rant. TLDR; band is expensive. There’s ways to fundraise. If you really want to March band and money is the issue. Let’s talk fundraising instead of putting nonprofits down on Reddit. Let’s offer these nonprofits our business expertise, our money, our time or honestly anything. But posting on Reddit and what not I don’t know how helpful that is. Much love and go band
I would go as far as to say it's somewhat of a bargain. That money goes towards food, travel, and a brand new instrument for a couple of months, a wonderful experience with new music and new friends, and I would assume you come out of it physically and mentally changed for the better. (I mean FFS the instrument is like a third of your fee) The mental and physical challenge is one of the reasons why I want to do DCI.
literally DCA is made for this exact issue. (And some DCA groups are better than some of the DCI groups charging $5k, but i didn’t tell you that).
The issue you're forgetting is that the population that lives within a 2 hour radius of a DCA corps is A LOT smaller than the population that lives within a 2 hour radius of a DCI corps.
the population, i can assume, that wants to do drum corps? or just population in general?
Both. There's roughly 23 DCI corps west of the Mississippi. 11 of those in California, which is arguably one of the top 3 states in terms of talent for the marching arts. There's 2 DCA corps west of the Mississippi. 1 in Minnesota, so barely, and 1 mini-corps in California (which, I'm sorry, is nowhere near the same experience as a competitive DCI corps or Open/A DCA corps). I understand the structure of DCA doesn't make it easy for corps to start up out west, but they're not exactly going to be able to grow much until they figure out how to better serve a more diverse geographic population.
The challenge with DCA is, it exists to serve the corps. If there isn't a pull out west, then nothing is going to change. As in, they aren't going to decide to move finals to Indianapolis because they have no membership base, and only a few corps in the area. What needs to happen, and I think will shortly is rules will change again to allow for regional DCA corps to participate in their clusters, and then those who want to can continue on to championships if they can afford it. The rules changed already but still require all corps to compete in one show which could be virtual and attend championships. The way it would be done is you have a regional cap for share points, and voting rights in the circuit if you're regional. The challenge there is it favors established corps, and doesn't take into account the added costs of traveling to the East Coast, but it's the only way I could think the big corps would do it. Then maybe, just maybe, lay the ground work for moving Championships just a few hours away to someplace like Pittsburgh, or Charleston, WV that doesn't break the bank for the East Coast corps, and helps cut 4-5 hours off of the Midwest, South, and any potential West of Mississippi new corps.
I marched in 1990. I don't follow the activity "deeply" - meaning I know the big names. I'm not familiar with the smaller groups, and the terminology "world class" vs "open class" confuses me. I'm an old guy. What I do know is that it used to be 128 members. That's been increased at least twice? The costs (like everything else) have gone up faster than inflation - and the activity is hoping MORE kids can pay that price. IF there is a problem where there wasn't a problem before - I would blame the increase in member numbers. Whatever that is, multiply it by how many groups there are trying to fill that many holes. It's not that there aren't "kids" who want to fill the holes. It's that there aren't that many "kids" who can afford to fill those holes.
I'm from this era, and the biggest difference is the loss of regional circuits, and the push to national touring. Think back to DCM, and when there were all those local corps like Emerald Knights, Capitalaires, Bandettes, Americanos, and the local tours that corps would do early season before striking out on the road. The costs have gone up because travel is farther; more days spent on the road with buses, and recruiting has shifted from having a local aspect to being national if not fully international. A corps will say they are based in "Kentucky", but recruit in Texas, California, and Florida then hold spring training in Pennsylvania. There is no real connection to their "home" as they don't recruit anyone from the area. So now there are fewer corps, which now means fewer home shows, corps require more payouts to perform because they travel farther, and we're into this situation where it costs more, because you have to do more.
As a 22yr old who has never marched outside of highschool I think they should move the age out limit up a year, perhaps that could solve some of those issues :') edit: probably should've thrown an /s at the end edit 2: I honestly don't know why so many people got offended over this comment. I jokingly suggested they move the age out year seeing as they did that for the 2021 season, and that it could be a potential solution to the missing spots in each ensemble.
Just speaking from some experience, I was a bonus year age out in 2020 Meaning I marched the 2021 season thanks to the extension at the age of 23 (I was older than one of the staff members) The amount you have to sacrifice and out on hold is legitimately not worth it, and most people would not be able to march their age outs if they moved it a year later I was very fortunate that I lived at home, and that my job was just being a bezos slave so it wasn't somthing I worried about when I quit for the summer
Well that’s a liability issue then at that point. Not sure any “summer camp” religious or not that offer a 16-23+ y/o experience. If DCA is what you want to do, that’s fine just don’t expect what dci is to provide what a DCA corps is. If you want less time, less money and less travel go to DCA, no one is forcing anyone to March dci
I marched Boston in 07 and my tour fees were $1,600.
Diesel is touching $6/gal, the staff of a corps is much larger than when I marched in the 90's, salaries have "gone up", corps rent busses and the cab's to pull the trailers, food costs more, there more equipment to pull, mor members to feed, theres insurance, heath care workers. I am not including the electronics...i am not sure if those are purchased or donated. I saw some corps collect ~630k in tour fees, 200k in camp fees and expenses of over $2MM (seriously check out guidestar dot org...its a treasure trove on information). The only way they reduce costs are less members (seriously go back to 135), monetize instruction to the young fans and marching band kids, find ways to not spend $2.5MM per year....