This past weekend, the Cameron Public Library held their Summer Library Program wrap-up, with a performance by the Fandazzi Fire Circus.  A whopping 447 people (maybe more) attended!  This would be a tremendous turn-out in any city, but Cameron is a small town!  More than a quarter of the population turned out for the festivities.

Here’s what Dawn, the library director, had to say:

To promote, I distributed signage to the post office, local grocery store, Senior Citizen’s Center and the local bank.  The bank advertised it on their digital marquee.  There were also signs at the library, we posted it on facebook and our website.  Rice Lake, Barron and Chetek libraries advertised for us, as well.  I sent it to all of the local papers, including Cameron’s newsletter.  In May, all of the children at the elementary school received our programming schedule when I took a week to make school visits (this was planned with the school library).  Last but not least, we had a kids’ program (the Zany Inventor) on Monday that attracted 77 children (also awesome attendance for us) and we reminded them to come to Thursday’s family program (the Fire Circus).  Other than that, it was on our voicemail outgoing message. 

I highly recommend the Fandazzi Fire Circus.  They kept in excellent contact with me, were very specific about meeting our needs (they contacted me a few times to find out what kind of music we wanted, the nature of the program, etc.) were reasonably priced (they cost us $624), offered to help us secure a fire permit, send info for the press, the crowd loved them, they cleaned up after themselves AND they cleaned up after the crowd – our park pavilion was spic and span.  They do have seven people and a live band (they write their own music) in the troupe, but four and the band went to another engagement.  Having just the three performers and programmed music was in no way detrimental to the performance. It is likely that more performers and the band would cost more.

While they were preparing between “acts,”  they offered information regarding fire safety (for the sake of safety,  they will absolutely not tell anyone what they are using for the fire-breathing), provided personal information about themselves (one was a Dr. of Physical Therapy, etc…), talked about the special insurance (clown insurance) that they have to have, and other educational information.  We selected the gypsy experience for our program, and they provided historical and other super interesting information about gypsies. They do offer whatever theme you want from country-style to hip hop programming.  We had an outdoor fire performance, but they also offer programs using led lights.