Here’s a little sneak peek behind the scenes at GBC Japão:
As part of our advertising campaign for the upcoming Saturday Class in Kichijoji! we’ve paid for an ad to be published in the Metropolis Magazine Classifieds section.
Advertising is one of those necessary expenses that you need to think about really cafeully when promoting your capoeira group. Sure, there’s plenty of ways to advertise for free, the best way is to do public street rodas. That being one of the things that makes Grupo Bantus Capoeira different from other groups. Mestre Pintor’s philosophy is to make capoeira accessible to everyone, not just “those in the know”. So expect at lot of public rodas in Inokashira Park as soon as the weather heats up!
Anyway, the Metropolis Magazine is one of those weekly must-reads for the ex-pat community here in Tokyo. Even the locals pick it up to see what’s going on in the English speaking world that lives and breathes in this city.
“The magazine is delivered to 67,500 readers from 600 distribution points throughout Tokyo, Yokohama and Chiba. There are a further 30,000 regular internet readers.”
GBC Japão has started off really slowly, with a few regular students coming on a weekly basis. We’ve seen many students come and go, from all four corners of the globe. It has been a learning experience for us, that’s for sure. We’ve had many interested but fruitless inquiries. Yet we’ve managed to get quite a good reputation for having a friendly, down-to-earth approach to capoeira. We’re not after money, the bottom line isn’t profit. And that’s something some other capoeira groups have forgotten about. Growth is definitely something on our agenda, but there’s no rush. Over the 200 classes I’ve taught, I’ve grown as an instructor, capoeirista, and as a person.
But the time has come.
A hora e essa
A hora e essa
Berimbau tocou na Capoeira
Berimbau tocou eu vou jogar
So, back to advertising.
I placed an ad using the Metropolis Magazine Classifieds online service. I thought carefully about the copy, included the Japanese copy from Cafune, uploaded a few images, and submitted the final work. We got the bill, and then went straight to the bank to deposit the money.
I later got an email saying the ad was considered commercial, and we would have to pay the full price expected of commercial businesses. When I read the price I could hear the sound effect of the GBC Japão budget shrinking considerably.
My heart almost broke. Should we blow our budget on paying the full price, or should I explain our situation in a heart-felt, sincere plea?
I chose the latter…
“Dear XXXXXX-san,
Thank you for your email, and explaining the situation.
I am a volunteer capoeira teacher here in Tokyo. We are applying for
official NPO status at the moment, but we are currently just a
not-for-profit group.
We have the cheapest class fees in Japan, and all that money goes straight
back into the group, and not to the teachers.
We have been teaching at public schools that are either free, or really
cheap to rent at night. But they are too far from the station, so it’s
difficult for new students to find our classes.
We are a very small group of both Japanese and Foreign students at the
moment, but I’m hoping to expand this year. We have been saving all our
money really hard since November 2004 so we could start a class close to
Kichijoji Station, and advertise that class. We have saved enough money to
hire a more expensive training venue once a week, and also to advertise the
new class in your magazine.
It takes many unpaid hours of volunteer work to keep our capoeira group
going. But I love capoeira so much, I don’t even think about all the hours I
put in. We often have fun non-profit events that we organize, and host for
our students. And we also peform for free at important local community
festivals.
One day we hope to get a full-time instructor from our group in Brazil to
teach in Japan. Our capoeira master in Brazil works closely with homeless
and poor kids, and trains them really hard so they can one day travel to
other countries to teach capoeira and learn about other cultures and
languages.
We currently have full-time Brazilian capoeira instructors living and
teaching capoeira in Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, Germany, Holland,
Israel, and I hope to make the next country Japan!
If you can help us out in any way, we would truly appreciate it.
I used your website to create the insertion order to include the ‘copy’ in
English and Japanese, plus 3 uploaded pictures for the online ad, and phone
number, email, and homepage URL. The duration was for 4 weeks at a total of
XXXXXYen, which we have paid today.
We hope you can understand we are neither a commerical business nor
corporation. Our primary objective is not to make a profit, but to promote
the art of capoeira. We also aim to provide a opportunity for a Brazilian
instructor to do an “artist in residence” stay in Japan. And lastly, we
promote a healthy lifestyle through the art of capoeira.”
The reply from the Metropolis Magazine read:
“Dear Mr Pietrantonio,
Thank you very much for the time to reply to us with such a sincere message.
Upon your request, we are going to process to insert your ad in Sports section.”
Our ad runs from March 10th to the 31st, keep your eyes peeled.
That was very well written Cacapa… I’m glad they realised your sincerity and decided to post the ad…
Way to go man! Good to know people still have hearts in this world of ours.
your words were definitely not wasted. way to go!