zine tours

[Harley R. Pageot]

I read about this somewhere. Maybe in Stolen Sharpie Revolution?

Like book tours, only with zinesters. Driving around, hitting up bookstores and zine libraries, and doing readings and selling of zines.

It sounded like pretty much the most awesome thing ever. Road trips + zines. What could be better?

But has anyone actually done this?

I'm sure it would be a blast but I just envision losing so much money on gas and food.

[Nico.]

we at QZAP did a "queer zinester roadshow" in the midwest with 7 different zinesters this past august. we hope to have it again in 2010.

[Harley R. Pageot]

Joe Biel said:

the trick here is that libraries and colleges have funding for this sort of thing.

This is the sort of thing we need to let each other know about on here.

There's all sorts of little ways to make money. Grants and public institutions with big budgets to spend. My public library is paying me $100 to run a zine-making workshop here. If you could get a library in every city to do that you could cover all your gas probably.

I took Greyhound once for a two hour trip and it was horrible. The Government of Ontario busses are much nicer and much cheaper. I never want to take a Greyhound again.

[Jillian McGrath]

I brought my distro on tour with a friends band for 45 days, which worked out really well because it brought zines to a whole new crowd of people that wouldnt otherwise come out to a zine event. It was much easier to make gas money that way, too.

[Alex Wrekk]

I had so much fun in Brighton! I had fun on my other UK stops too. I had a britRail pass and for most of my trips no one even checked off the dates so I could have gone to more places. I just got back from a bit of a zine tour in Canada and a few stops on the east coast. I look at it more as a vacation than anything and being able to see zine friends.

Emma Jane Falconer said:

A good way to do it in the EU I should add is to buy a Eurail ticket. It covers unlimited train travel in all EU countries, and is a great way to see multiple countries cheaply and conveniently.

[Giz]

she toured UK. and did only one long-week "gig" in france, along with Isy morgenmuffel and Ed lasthour.
it was for la fanzinothèque of Poitiers' birthday. I met them there.

I went to a Mort-né event in Aix-en-provence. such events exists in France, but they are like "unique".
zines events on my list :

- Portland Zine Symposium (2010 !)
- Calgary Anarchist Bookfair
- London Zine Symposium
- Brighton

the Richmond, VA and Philadelphia, PA seems cool too ! are these events only already set in english-speaking country ?

[Giz]

and almost six different "languages-borders". not every european are english-speaking.

Harley R. Pageot said:

I'd actually think it would be easier in Europe becaue everything's so close together. You have six or seven different countries in the same amount of area as southern Ontario.

[Emma Jane Falconer]

Yeah, in NW Europe and Greece you'd have plenty of interest in english language stuff because there's enough people with the level of english required, but somewhere like the south of Spain or Hungary? Not so lucky.

Giz said:

and almost six different "languages-borders". not every european are english-speaking.

Harley R. Pageot said:

I'd actually think it would be easier in Europe becaue everything's so close together. You have six or seven different countries in the same amount of area as southern Ontario.

[Harley R. Pageot]

This sounds pretty awesome in that they just rented a Winnebago and drove around. That would be so fun.