Cadets Suspend for 2024

[Keith Hall]

How many more will follow the Cadets? If more follow, should directors and DCI meet to discuss a solution? Even with SCV coming back, will they be in top 12 again? This is a serious situation and directors have to be honest to themselves and the MM's (and their parents). The touring model (and we all knew YEARS ago that it forced many corps to fold up), has to be revamped. The season is already shorter than 30 - 50 years ago. I remember doing 3 contests in May plus several shows in June. We went into September. Today it starts in July and ends 6 weeks later. The huge expense for transportation, the continuous changing of uniforms year to year, the loss of IDENTITY, purchasing new percussion and horns.....! No wonder corps have financial issues. How much does a kid pay to be in a corps? $5,000.? 

    Speaking of the touring model....Did the 1970's and 1980's DCI brain trust and corps directors ever think about the smaller corps? I think they thought of only themselves. Popular corps like 27th, Bridgemen, Velvet Knights, Guardsmen, etc gone

[Terri Schehr]

1 hour ago, leed17 said:

This past weekend was the Cadets Alumni weekend in North Jersey - Friday night was supposed to be a Meet and Greet with the Cadets board...was anyone there?? Would love to hear what was said and discussed that evening.  

I predict 🦗 

[cixelsyd]

It is important that we understand where we are and how we got here, if we want the Cadets and similar corps with us perennially.

Drum corps have been taking years off, or folding permanently, for as long as there have been drum corps.  That is the nature of things when an organization relies on charitable fundraising.  When that charity fades, or when costs escalate beyond its ability to keep up, the corps cannot continue.  Meanwhile, new corps might form just as often as old corps fail.  For many years, that is how things went.

That all changed in the 1970s.  Why?  Because that is when the cost of operating a competing drum corps shifted from "under control" to "escalating".  Some of that was self-inflicted.  The one major activity response to the situation (the formation of DCI) was to add more costs.  DCI was founded to make touring sustainable.  Fifty years later, you can certainly claim they did that - but only for a limited number of corps.  What did that do for the rest?

DCI was formed by the richest/most ambitious corps, to serve the richest/most ambitious corps.  Only the richest/most ambitious corps have ever had voting power on their decisions.  As a result, DCI has spent their 50 years with an institutional bias toward creating more self-inflicted cost escalation that the richest/most ambitious corps thought they could afford.  Fifty years later, you can certainly claim they could afford it all - but only a limited number of corps.  What did that do to the rest?

I think I will stop there, because if this does not sink in... well, we are sunk.

[LabMaster]

39 minutes ago, cixelsyd said:

It is important that we understand where we are and how we got here, if we want the Cadets and similar corps with us perennially.

Drum corps have been taking years off, or folding permanently, for as long as there have been drum corps.  That is the nature of things when an organization relies on charitable fundraising.  When that charity fades, or when costs escalate beyond its ability to keep up, the corps cannot continue.  Meanwhile, new corps might form just as often as old corps fail.  For many years, that is how things went.

That all changed in the 1970s.  Why?  Because that is when the cost of operating a competing drum corps shifted from "under control" to "escalating".  Some of that was self-inflicted.  The one major activity response to the situation (the formation of DCI) was to add more costs.  DCI was founded to make touring sustainable.  Fifty years later, you can certainly claim they did that - but only for a limited number of corps.  What did that do for the rest?

DCI was formed by the richest/most ambitious corps, to serve the richest/most ambitious corps.  Only the richest/most ambitious corps have ever had voting power on their decisions.  As a result, DCI has spent their 50 years with an institutional bias toward creating more self-inflicted cost escalation that the richest/most ambitious corps thought they could afford.  Fifty years later, you can certainly claim they could afford it all - but only a limited number of corps.  What did that do to the rest?

I think I will stop there, because if this does not sink in... well, we are sunk.

Please go back and look at the charter corps of DCI.  I challenge you to prove they were all the richest corps serving the richest corps.  Boston for one was far from rich.  And within a few short years some of those corps were no longer around or were struggling.  That alone confirms they were not all rich.  Please let’s not have revisionist history here.

[IllianaLancerContra]

9 hours ago, Jeff Ream said:

and they aren't all there at the same time or being paid for not being there. it's been said a zillion times, but in todays world, people just can't take the whole summer off anymore.

But don’t the Corps pay $ to fly them in and out over summer?   That has gotta add up too. 

[IllianaLancerContra]

2 hours ago, leed17 said:

This past weekend was the Cadets Alumni weekend in North Jersey - Friday night was supposed to be a Meet and Greet with the Cadets board...was anyone there?? Would love to hear what was said and discussed that evening.  

I wonder which meeting would be the bigger ####-show - Cadets alumni, Madison alumni, or SCV alumni?

[cixelsyd]

14 minutes ago, LabMaster said:

Please go back and look at the charter corps of DCI.  I challenge you to prove they were all the richest corps serving the richest corps.  Boston for one was far from rich.  And within a few short years some of those corps were no longer around or were struggling.  

And those corps, as a result, were not the ones with perennial voting rights making decisions that increased costs.

[craiga]

24 minutes ago, LabMaster said:

Please go back and look at the charter corps of DCI.  I challenge you to prove they were all the richest corps serving the richest corps.  Boston for one was far from rich.  And within a few short years some of those corps were no longer around or were struggling.  That alone confirms they were not all rich.  Please let’s not have revisionist history here.

THIS!

And one more thing....if I hear another person erroneously blame "new uniforms and drums and pit percussion every year" I swear my head is going to explode.   Nearly every corps in the top 15 or 16 gets new uniforms every year FOR FREE from the various uniform companies as part of their endorsement agreements.  Stanbury in the case of Cadets, BD, and Bluecoats...FJ Miller for Boston like many others.  And, everyone has percussion endorsements with various drum companies wherein they get brand new drums and front ensemble every year as well, also part of endorsements.  In BAC'S case, at some point during the first week of spring training,  an 18 wheeler shows up to Vermont with the entire package.   The members excitedly unpack the new equipment and pack up the old and it goes back to the manufacturer to be refurbished and remarketed.  And if you're about to say this is only because BAC is an "elite", not true! Boston's first endorsement was with Ludwig in 1990, after they had placed 17th in 1989.

For SOME people here on dcp who fancy themselves as drum corps know it alls, they know surprisingly little about drum corps.

And to circle back to Cadets, not only did they not have to pay for their Atlas uniforms, they still own their traditional unis for parades and such. 

It seems to me that some older fans just love to  weaponize their contempt for modern drum corps to blame those modernizations for financial issues ....even though drum corps has ALWAYS  been a financial challenge.

And when I say older fans, for the record,  I'm 63.

Edited October 16, 2023 by craiga
Grammar

[IllianaLancerContra]

So, page 60.
Many ideas & thoughts  on how Drum Corps has gotten to the financial precipice.   Two questions:

1.  Can Drum Corps be financially fixed?

2. How, in October 2023, can we fix it?  

[TheOneWhoKnows]

2 minutes ago, IllianaLancerContra said:

So, page 60.
Many ideas & thoughts  on how Drum Corps has gotten to the financial precipice.   Two questions:

1.  Can Drum Corps be financially fixed?

2. How, in October 2023, can we fix it?  

1) Drum corps have to have multiple income streams. They cannot rely on donors and member dues.

1A) There needs to be more ground/local support and foundation built to sustain an organization's future. 

2) Pray that corps start to look at corporate sponsors. Find more grant funding. Find a #### way to make money. Everyone wants to bash the bingo halls, but income is income.