Recently the Sarasota Pride Organization had a fundraiser at McCurdy’s Comedy Theatre featuring out gay comedian Brian Bradley. The event was a benefit to support presentation of the annual Pride Festival. About five dozen members and friends of the LGBT community attended it. And I was there, too.
I’ve been a permanent resident of the Sarasota community for 11 years and have regularly patronized LGBT events and businesses,. Through the clubs I’ve gotten to know or recognize hundreds of residents in the local LGBT community as well as many LGBT men and women who regularly visit our area.
But at McCurdy’s, I did not know or recognize one single person! Just who were those 60 or so people and why have I not seen them socializing in the clubs and patronizing other LGBT enterprises? Or maybe more importantly, where were the numerous other men and women I’ve known from and/or seen at area events or in local establishments created especially for our LGBT community?
Some would conjecture that the McCurdy’s crowd was probably made up mostly of the settled couples living here who socialize among themselves and rarely—if ever—go out, and then only to attend a benefit event. Others might say there are many local LGBTs who, for whatever reasons, are in the closet and would not or could not display themselves at a public place like the Comedy Theatre.
The McCurdy’s benefit was not the first time I’ve encountered these phenomena in Sarasota. Last summer, when a Sunday “Tea Dance” was started for us at The Cabana Inn on South Trail, there were about 300 people enjoying the first one. But where were they after that first afternoon when this LGBT activity needed their patronage to forestall its dwindling and eventual demise?
A similar thing happened at Esca on Main Street, a place that presented LGBT patrons an atmosphere more upscale than the local norm. And didn’t trendy Polo in Lakewood Ranch try doing the same thing for us? Even though these were just one-day-a-week things, I think they were examples why it’s not viable giving credence to the frequently-voiced complaint that all LGBT social venues in Sarasota have been grungy and trashy.
It appears the consensus of why local LGBTs don’t support commercial venues is that operators are not giving us what we think we want. Well, how can a businessperson start and operate what is thought to be wanted if there are not indications that community patronage will make it successful? Word has it that even ownership of the enormously successful Georgie’s Alibi nixed Sarasota as the place for a third club because there was insufficient evidence for it being adequately supported here. So after St. Petersburg and Wilton Manors, he took his business to Palm Springs, Calif.
There’s no question that we LGBTs can be a fickle bunch! Therefore it behooves business owners to continually challenge us with a variety of enticements intended to attract and satisfy LGBT patrons.
Plus, they must not keep secret what they have to offer. They must promote their enterprises with wide-spread print and electronic marketing; putting up posters within is not sufficient! And they should offer a variety of internal complimentaries to show appreciation for their customers.
Then it is up to us in the permanent local LGBT community—along with our part-year residents and visitors—to justify the business’ investments by regularly supporting, encouraging and patronizing what has been created for us. The same holds true for events such as the annual Sarasota Pride Festival and its associated activities.
Perhaps limited publicity played a role in the McCurdy’s benefit not being as well supported as it might have been. Apparently the only public information put out about it was through the Sarasota Pride Organization’s e-mail list and evidently that was not enough to earn the success the event deserved.
Another reason to widely promote events and businesses is the enormous competition for leisure time and leisure dollars, and we LGBTs supposedly have more of both than any other identifiable segment of society. Demonstrating we’re willing to invest both in an entity offering us quality is an unquestioned reality.
Word-of-mouth is the best promotion to assure a successful enterprise. But to earn the desired results there has to be a people who already patronize and are pleased with a business or who already know and are excited about an event.
Does all this mean we Sarasota LGBTs—and, indeed, our counterparts in other cities and towns—are going to always be caught in “damned-if-we-do, damned-if-we-don’t” situations no matter who, what, when, where, why, how, etc? I do hope not!
Oh, well. This conundrum—to borrow from The King and I—is a puzzlement!
