Features
Kevin Rondeau Of Jamflow Management Talks Twiddle’s Merch Game
courtesy Kevin Rondeau – Twiddle manager Kevin Rondeau
on tour with the band in 2019.
With traditional touring on hold during the pandemic, merch sales have become more important than ever to a band’s livelihood. Vermont-based jam band Twiddle is one act whose management team has stepped up to take their merch game to the next level.
Twiddle is co-managed by Jamflow Management’s Kevin Rondeau and Daniel Travis with 11E1even Group’s Ben Baruch.
Rondeau, who started working with Twiddle about 10 years ago, talked to Pollstar about overseeing the band’s merchandise and how the team has been offering special releases and limited quantities of livestream-specific merch.
“The pandemic kind of allowed us to really hone in and make the merchandising revenue work harder for us via better profit margins,” Rondeau says.
“And that was just one ingredient, along with general determination and optimism, that allowed us to fight through the pandemic and hopefully come out the other side bigger and better.”
– A stream-specific poster
celebrating Twiddle’s March 11-12, 2021, livestream performances.
Pollstar: How does merch sales rank as far as the band’s income streams?
Kevin Rondeau: In a normal year, merchandise on tour outperforms the online store by about 2 to 1. Once the pandemic really took hold we quickly pivoted to a bunch of live streaming. Ben and 11E1even created [music and content series] Live From Out There, which was a super smart move. … And from the merchandise perspective, it was integral to us surviving the last year financially because merchandise pivoted from, “OK, we’re going to project our revenue on the tour for 20 shows, 500 to 1,000 people a night. And we’re going to spend all this money and then kind of run through it on the whole tour.”
Sometimes those projections are spot on and other times they are a little bit off. However, the livestream (think presale) model allowed for only printing and manufacturing what we sold. So in that way, COVID forced us to sharpen our profit margins in a big way, and we learned from it.
We always have plenty of classic Twiddle apparel items available online, but the event-specific [poster, pin, T-shirt] merch always does better. Fans watch shows on their laptops and TVs, and they still want a beautiful piece of artwork to remember the show by.
Which items are usually sold at the merch table?
I have a number of friends who work for different bands. Jimmy Farrell handles tour merchandise for Phish and the Trey Anastasio Band, and happens to love Twiddle too. Jimmy is the sweetest person ever and he’s been able to offer a lot of advice as far as how much we should order and bring on tour.
Ultimately, I think the most important thing to remember is that less is more. It’s easy to have all this variety, but in the end you’re counting on them to buy a T-shirt or poster. Think quality over quantity.
– Twiddle’s cutom rolling papers by Ziggi® Papers via Epic Supply
in honor of the band’s 15th anniversary
Twiddle played a few drive-in shows during the pandemic – did you sell merch?
Really, it has ebbed and flowed with the number of cases of the virus. Now we feel more confident that if we just keep everybody six feet apart, wear masks and we’re outside, we can more or less run our full operation.
Twiddle is one of the latest bands to offer custom rolling papers by Ziggi® Papers via Epic Supply. How have fans responded?
More and more states are [legalizing marijuana] – the tipping point of legalization is seemingly upon us, and there’s a lot of good people in the Twiddle community who use cannabis on a regular basis. So we sell grinders, we sell stash jars for flower. The rolling papers especially are great quality and people love them. Chris Gallen, one of my go-to graphic designers, made a special design for the band’s 15th anniversary last year.
– A few examples of Twiddle’s popular pins
What are the biggest sellers online?
Enamel pins are the biggest seller and posters are not far behind. The pin scene is full of traders and collectors, a true community that grew decisively in 2020. Many people have found Twiddle through “pinning.” The fans of particular artists, and the fans of the bands are all intermingling on FB because of limited edition band merchandise. This dynamic is beneficial for everyone. On behalf of Twiddle, I couldn’t finish this interview without saying that we have the best fans on the planet. And we love them.
Visit twiddlemusic.com/merchandise/ to check out Twiddle’s merch.
READ MORE:
How 11E1even Group’s Live From Out There Grossed $600,000 In A Pandemic