One of the promoters of Carnival, Val Cuffy has called for greater promotion of Dominica’s Carnival product on an international scale.
Cuffy, on DBS’s ‘Talking Point’ on Monday, lamented the lack of preparation and small-scale production of Carnival in Dominica. He stated that organizers must plan events much in advance, and present well-thought initiatives to the Government.
“We need to go and sit down and talk to Government, say ‘Listen, this is what I want to do’, and then you can engage the private sector, and then people will even want to buy into this; but you cannot just sit down there and figure ‘Ok, we’ll have nothing to do until that next time around’, and then hoping that you will get something by then,” he said.
He suggested Dominica embark on a Carnival World Tour, in order to market Dominica internationally.
“Do we package a Dominica Carnival World Tour? Can we get Dice, the Carnival Queen, some Bouyon artistes? Can we put them together, and say ‘call Antigua, call St. Lucia’. Let’s go inside there, bring a Dominica flag,” Cuffy stated.
He explained that he believes that the “fear factor” keeps persons from saying what needs to be said. However, he declared that due to experience, he is able to make an informed comment on the matter.
“These are dynamics that can be worked out and people are afraid to say these things because of the fear factor. I understand where we are at…I am saying that purely as a Dominican, as somebody who has been in the arts, and I have no problem in marketing, in promoting,” he noted.
He insisted that all parties involved in the planning of Dominica’s Carnival collaborate, and begin marketing and planning on a greater scale now.
“I think we are at a good juncture; now is the time that we can make sure that we can bring all the parties together,” Cuffy said.
Val …I really appreciate your post-mortem of the carnival programme. An honest and consultative discussion is required to determine what is best for DA now, medium and long term. Marketing DA carnival is right, but what are you marketing.
The points for discussion are:
1. Carnival date
2. carnival king/queen – selected to represent the parishes, too many pageants all forgotten the day after the event.
3. carnival costumes/parade – selected to represent the parishes
4. calypso king/queen/junior – selected to represented the parishes
5. the organisation to ensure all is done properly as per criteria, rules etc should be independent of the government with a dotted line to the ministry of sports and culture and other interested parties as a way of informing.
6. it needs to be people centric and not business led, although business principles need to apply such as the mission, strategy, plans, programmes, resources, funding and finance management.
FOOD…
Mr cuffy. Music and entertainment is a private enterprising thing.
Domininica is not a socialist or communist society. If you believe what you say, then form a private company, and do what you say
I heard the same cries 30 years ago and to date, nothing has changed. Let’s start by creating songs that people want to listen to and dance to. Once that’s done, interest in our carnival activities will grow naturally.
Just about every month on the calendar there is a carnival taking place, so we will have to come much stronger than what we are offering right now.Keep in mind too that every island thinks their carnival is the best, and they save up to go to their respective carnival. This is just food to thought.
Val, just concentrate on your pharmacy business my friend. You like too much traveling at govt’s expense I seem to remember. Waste of money promoting our carnival. You don’t think other countrie do not have carnival, better, bigger, more beautiful than ours? Not only in the Caribbean and South America but also in Europe.
I concur right now Calypso and Carnival is over in Dominica but that doesn’t mean everything should come to an end , yes , there are other places that have carnival and I see no reason why we cannot tap into that, those are just a few Islands what about Toronto and New Jersey we could try that also.
Another matter is that our Calypso songs stay in D’ica they are not played out side on the open market we need to change that, I sit in A’gua airport and all I hear is their Calypso not even one of ours, Let’s try to push the culture get every one involved we need to move to the next level .
Patriot, I must inform you that it are not just few islands that celebrate carnival. Haiti has its carnival, as has the Dominican Republic as well as Puerto Rico (especially in Ponce, where it has been celebrated for over 250 years!) Even Cuba has its carnival (Santiago is the centre for this). Ttrinidad has its own a the same time as ours as have Martinique and Guadeloupe. And these are just some of the islands, catholic in tradition that all celebrate carnival as the same time as us. Not to forget the Dutch Antilles and so on. All over Europe carnival is also celebrated at the same time. Our carnival is certainly not unique and people have plenty of choice where to take part in the celebrations. Dominica would be hard pushed to compete with that.
val suggestion are always if welcome but show business is not about sympathies or patronage it is about making money for the promoters and artist . if you are taking suchan exercise you need to find out from the promoters which artist they will accept. stop patronizing Dominican artists with talk encourage them to produce work that people will want to use for entertainment.first hold such a show in dominica and see how successful it will be. do respect your suggestion but I am only seeing things from a different perspective.
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Val I want to shake your big toe. Why aren’t we using our winners and top artists to market our products? To mee all I see the queen doing is competing which is good but we can use them as ambassors. Look at Dice 8 time king and we are not using him to our potential? It is the organizers and the promoters that have to tap into our talent to bring us on the international market. Trinidad started planning already for 2017. When I left the hotel we were informed that they are 70 percent booked for next year.
Trinidad and Barbados were like us but they used their resources to build their brand on the international market. We can do this. It takes all of us.
Well said Val cuffy You should hold the post of Colin Piper He has no ideas This guy should not i repeat not hold the position of Discover Dominica
Great You should be holding the post Colin Piper has This guy is a waste oh please
It’s not a “fear factor” but an EGO factor. The people involved on the boards and committees are stuck in their old ways and don’t welcome new ideas or participants. It’s unfortunate, but true.
People allow the Egotistical people to roam free because they fear how they will be victimised for honesty. That is killing everything in Dominica. All people in charge are fearful of anyone who challenges them. Get agriculture right and all else should follow. Our tourism product is not ready for heaving marketing. Clean up the place get the infrastructure, access, safety, and attitude of the service providers right then we good to go.
We need a new level of professionalism to survive and grow as a tourist destination and as a nation.
So the Gov-we-ment must have a say in Carnivel? Caval!!! Then we’ll have to go to the gov-we- ment to plan our Christmas too? Well, they don’t want anything to do with God; Just satan.
It is time to be proactive. It’s not too early to start the planning for Carnival 2017 with the post mortem meeting for Carnival 2016.
Most of you people with nothing important to talk about are more then happy to get that fifteen seconds of fame on DNO to talk crap. What sort of Dominica Carnival Product do you have to promote on International scale, the comment does not even make sense, unless you are talking about something physical for sale!
By, the time you get into the middle of saying nothing, you could not avoid drawing the government into it. One of the reasons most of what you people try to do in Dominica fails, is all due to government involvement, and intervention.
As far as I know Dominica is the only place on earth where government is involved into Carnival, this is absurd. Carnival is a people’s affair, its a private matter, which government should not be involved into, hence the whole venture becomes political!
You all politicized everything in the country; now I read some so called man with nothing to not elected by the people talking crap about he is pleased with result of carnival…
…..i dont understand you at all sir……Do the people of Dominica choose and hire and keep extending the contract of someone who is supposed to be Marketing the country….as their FULL TIME JOB….may i add….getting paid from TAX PAYERS MONEY for years with little to no result????….and we cannot ask the government who keeps hiring them anything? Further more….WE have nothing to promote on an Internationally because the same Organisation who is to liaise with other Organisations and also young artist (AND I AM ONE OF THEM..thus i know what i speak of.) to promote our music, art and culture…chooses to play favorites and put their EGO in front of their work?!?!?! We cannot go on like this….people have to accept responsibility for their actions..or in this case…non-action for years! I dont agree with the Government bashing on everything….but in this case my friend it is very valid…because of the constant repeat of nonsense when better persons are here to do the job.
You know everything Mr.genious why can you come to DA to give some assistance in all that you know.You a JA.
what is marketing? many people do not even know. ads? promo?
How is it being marketed? Would like to know. Tnx