The complete guide to getting a tour and a venue on the same page before doors: when to start, who to talk to, what to send, what to collect, and the checklist and email template to run it with.
Updated September 4, 202614 minute readWritten from real touring experience
What advancing actually is
Somewhere between the contract being signed and the truck backing up to the dock, somebody has to make sure the venue knows what the show needs and the show knows what the venue has. That process is the advance. Done well, load-in day is boring in the best way: everyone already knows the answers. Done badly, it is a morning of surprises that cost time, money, and goodwill.
Definition
Advancing a show is the process of confirming every operational detail of an event with the venue or promoter before the day of the show: schedule, production, labor, hospitality, security, parking, box office, and settlement. The output of a good advance is a single agreed picture of the day that both sides have signed off on.
The advance is not a formality and it is not just forwarding the rider. Riders describe what the show wants in a perfect world. The advance is the negotiation between that document and a specific building on a specific date, with a specific local crew, curfew, and dock situation. Every "TBD" you leave in the advance becomes a decision someone has to make on show day that could potentially impact your show, usually the person with the least context.
When to start, and what happens when
For a standard club or theater date, open the advance four to six weeks out. For larger rooms, fly dates, festivals, or international shows, start six to eight weeks out because travel, freight, and visas stretch every timeline. Here is the rhythm that works across most tours:
6–4wk
Initial contact for the advance
Send the introduction email with your advance pack attached. Confirm you have the right contact, the date, the billing, and the deal points as you understand them.
4–3wk
Collect and compare + schedule an advance call to lock the day
Get the venue's tech pack and work through it against your rider. Flag every conflict now: power, rigging points, stage size, curfew, labor rules, backline gaps. Then get on the advance call and lock the day: load-in, soundcheck, doors, set times, curfew, labor calls, catering counts, parking, and how support acts fit into changeovers.
1wk
Close the gaps
Chase every open item. Confirm guest list process and cutoffs, credentials, security briefing, and any late production changes on either side.
24h
Distribute the day
Turn the finished advance into the day sheet and get it to your crew, the bus, and the venue. Everyone should be reading from the same version.
Day
Verify on arrival
Walk the building against the advance within the first hour: dock, power, stage, dressing rooms, catering. Catching a miss at 9 a.m. is a fix. Catching it at 5 p.m. is a problem.
Who you actually advance with
Not every building routes the advance the same way, and guessing wrong wastes a week. Your counterpart is usually one of these people:
Venue production manager. The most common counterpart in clubs, theaters, and sheds. Owns the building's technical reality: stage, power, labor, dock, curfew.
Promoter representative. On promoted dates, the promoter's production or operations person may run the advance and loop the venue in themselves.
Talent buyer or general manager. In smaller rooms one person books the show and runs the building. Expect slower replies and confirm the essentials by phone.
The first question of every advance is simply: "Who is the venue's primary advance contact?" Get one name, keep everything in one thread with that name, and copy your own team so nothing lives only in your inbox.
What to send: the advance pack
Make the venue's job easy. One email, everything attached, filenames that say what they are and who you are. The standard pack:
Technical rider. Audio, lighting, video, and staging needs, current for this tour, not the one from two years ago.
Stage plot and input list. The two documents the house crew will actually print and tape to the console.
Hospitality rider. Dressing room needs, catering counts, dietary restrictions, towels, the real quantities you need.
Proposed day-of schedule. Your ideal load-in through curfew. It will change. Sending it first anchors the conversation.
Travel and arrival details. Bus and truck count, trailer or box truck dimensions, arrival time, shore power needs, and how many parking spots that actually means.
Guest list policy. How many spots, who approves, and when your list closes.
The advance checklist: what to collect from the venue
This is the core of the job. Every item below is a question someone will ask on show day. Answer them all in the advance and the day runs itself. Print this section and work through it per date, or keep it as your master list.
The Advance ChecklistFrom "How to Advance a Show" · advancewithme.com/guides/how-to-advance-a-show
Show: Venue: Date: Advance contact:
Contacts & schedule
Day-of contact name and cell for production, promoter rep, and box office
Load-in time and dock availability
Soundcheck order and times for all acts
Doors, set times, changeover lengths
Hard curfew and what happens if you hit it
Venue address for GPS vs the actual dock address
Load-in, parking & power
Dock type, truck ramp, push distance, elevator dimensions if any
Bus and truck parking locations and permits
Shore power for buses: how many, what amperage
Stage power: service type, amperage, distro location, tie-in rules
Stage & rigging
Stage dimensions, trim height, wing space, crossover
Rigging points, weight limits, house plot
Barricade: exists, type, who sets it
Risers available: sizes, wheels, quantity
Confetti, haze, or pyro rules and permits
Audio, lighting & video
PA make, model, and coverage; house console at FOH and monitors
Monitor world: wedges, IEM racks, who mixes
Lighting rig plot and console; house LD or yours
Video walls or projection, inputs, who runs it
Snake runs, FOH position and dimensions
Backline & labor
House backline available
What the venue provides vs what you carry
Labor call: how many hands, union rules, minimums, meal penalties
Runner availability and rules
Local production rentals: who is the go-to vendor
Dressing rooms & hospitality
Room count, capacity, showers, laundry access
Catering: in-house, buyout, or local; meal times and counts
Dietary needs confirmed against your rider
Wifi network and password for band and crew
Towels, water, ice: quantities and where they land
Security, credentials & guest list
Security count and briefing time
Credential system: wristbands, laminates, who issues what
Guest list process, cutoff time, and will call location
Meet and greet logistics if any
After-show access rules
Box office & settlement
Current ticket count and daily wraps leading in
Capacity, kills, and comps against the deal
Settlement time, place, and who settles
Payment method confirmed: check, wire, cash
Merch rate, who sells, and where the stand goes
If the answer is not written down in the advance, you do not have the answer. · Free from Advance with Me · advancewithme.com
Every tour trims or extends this list.
The principle does not change: if the answer is not written down in the advance, you do not have the answer.
The advance email that gets answered
Venue production managers advance dozens of shows a month. The emails that get fast, complete replies share three traits: they identify the show clearly in the subject line, they attach everything, and they make the next step obvious: send the tech pack, then get the advance call on the calendar. Here is a template to start from:
Advance email template
Subject: ADVANCE | [Artist] @ [Venue] | [Day, Date]
Hello,
We're looking forward to working with you on the upcoming [Artist] performance at [Venue].
Below you'll find our tour's essential contacts, along with our technical and hospitality riders for your review.
Please provide the venue's current tech pack, as well as any venue-specific information, policies, or other details we should be aware of in preparation for our advance call.
Once we receive these materials, we'll follow up with a date and time to schedule our advance call, where we can review, recap, and finalize all production, hospitality, and logistical details.
Tour Essential Contacts
Tour Manager
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
Production Manager
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
Tour Security Advance
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
Merchandise Manager
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
Tour Catering
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
BOH + Hospitality
Name:
Mobile:
Email:
Thank you, and we look forward to working with your team.
Best,
[Your Name]
[Title / Company]
Two habits that pay off across a whole run: keep one thread per show so the record of what was agreed lives in one place, and confirm anything critical that was decided on a phone call back into the thread in writing. "Per our call: doors at 7, curfew 11, four hands at load-in" takes ten seconds and provides a reference to changes that happen through the advance.
From advance to show day
The advance is only useful if it leaves your inbox. Once the details are locked, they need to become the documents your team actually reads:
The day sheet. The one-page summary of the day: times, addresses, contacts, and notes. Our day sheet template and guide covers how to build one people actually read.
The labor call. Who is called, when, and for what, shared with the venue so the steward and your crew chief agree before the first case rolls.
Updated riders and plots. If the advance changed the plot or the inputs, the version at FOH needs to be the new one.
This handoff is where tools earn their keep. Advance with Me was built around exactly this flow: the advance is collected in structured sections, venues fill in their side through an invite link instead of email back-and-forth, and the same data becomes daysheets, labor calls, and clean PDF exports without retyping. The crew sees their day in the AWM Go iPhone app, which keeps working offline when the building has no signal.
Where advances go wrong
Six failure modes cover most show-day disasters. All of them are preventable in the advance:
The unconfirmed forward
The rider was sent, so everyone assumes it was read. Sending is not advancing. Every critical item needs an explicit yes from a named person.
The schedule nobody agreed to
The tour has one schedule, the venue has another, and both sides find out at load-in. Lock times on the advance call three weeks out and redistribute every time they change.
The power surprise
The building has half the amperage the rig needs, or the tie-in requires a house electrician who was never called. Power questions go in the first email, not the last.
The curfew discovery
Hard curfews, noise ordinances, and union meal penalties change the whole day's math. Ask early, then build the schedule backward from them.
The version problem
Three PDFs of the schedule are in circulation and every department has a different one. Keep one source of truth and make updates land everywhere at once.
The single point of failure
The whole advance lives in one person's inbox, and that person is asleep on the bus when the venue calls. Advances belong somewhere the whole team can see.
Frequently asked questions
How far in advance should you advance a show?
Four to six weeks for standard club and theater dates. Six to eight weeks for large rooms, fly dates, international shows, or heavy production. You can advance a small show in a week when you have to, but anything you learn late is something you can no longer change.
Who advances the show if there is no tour manager?
Whoever is most responsible for the night going well: often the artist's manager, the bandleader, or the most organized person in the van. The checklist does not shrink because the team did. It just gets prioritized: schedule, power, backline, money.
What is the difference between advancing and settling?
Advancing happens before the show and aligns operations. Settlement happens the night of the show and reconciles the money against the deal. A clean advance makes settlement a ten-minute conversation instead of an argument.
Is advancing a festival different?
Festivals flip the direction: their advance team sends you the packet, the portal, and the deadlines. Your job is to respond completely and on time, flag rider conflicts early, and translate the festival's rules into instructions your own crew will actually read.
What if the venue does not respond?
Bump the thread after three or four days, then call the venue's main line, then ask the promoter or talent buyer to reconnect you. Keep the questions short and numbered. If it is show week and email is still quiet, get the essentials on a phone call and confirm them back in writing.
Put it to work
Run your next advance in a system built for it.
Advance with Me turns this whole process into a structured workflow: venues answer through invite links, AI intake pulls details from tech packs, and the finished advance becomes daysheets and PDFs without retyping.
