Another amazing year has passed!

Pole for a Purpose celebrated their fifth year with a sold out crowd at the David A. Straz Center for the Performing Arts in Tampa, Florida on August 15th, 2015.

Performers, attendees, volunteers, and vendors all gathered together to celebrate the strength, grace, and beauty of Pole Dance while supporting a great cause, CASA. The Straz Center allowed us great improvements in lighting and sound. Plus, the unique theater layout offered amazing stage views for all.

Creativity Abounds!

Attendees have been raving about the outstanding variety in theme from each performance. Some things you may have enjoyed are fun props, a live drummer on stage, unique story telling elements, plus the addition of an aerial apparatus, the Lyra, during a pole routine. This marked improvement in creativity was no accident.

In 2015, the noticeable increase in creativity was thanks to our new Creative Concept emphasis. For the first time, we added an additional field on the performer application asking that each applicant describe their performance’s Creative Concept. Though creativity was always encouraged, this was the first time we asked applicants to take the time to elaborate on their Creative Concept during the application process. The result was an outpouring of applications with amazing, diverse concepts ranging from crazy, dark, funny, bizarre, cheeky, emotional, warm, movie-themed, and more. We’ve never had so much fun reading applications! Going into 2016, this is now a required portion of applying to Pole for a Purpose. We never have, and never will, require certain tricks, experience, or skill levels, but we are excited to see the diverse and creative ideas our applicants share on the stage at Pole for a Purpose making each year more anticipated and thrilling to watch! More information will be shared in the coming months through Facebook, our website, and our new YouTube channel.

Straz Success!

If you’ve attended Pole for a Purpose before 2015, you know that ticketing is one of our biggest challenges. Or should we say was! In years past, we have had guests waiting in lines around the building, in cocktail attire, in the Summer heat, so this is definitely an element we are so happy to have remedied. Thanks to the experienced team of professionals at The Straz Center, guests at the 2015 Pole for a Purpose were whisked inside with minimal delays. Everyone loved that air conditioning while getting checked in! Though we are always working to balance the cost:benefit trade off, we were happy to hear attendees loved the streamlined ticketing experience and enjoyed the added comfort.

Other great aspects of The Straz: two well staffed bars, snacks, lovely ushers, room for vendors (and they got to see the show!), comfortable seats, and great views all around!

Donation Time!

Thanks to another wonderful year with everyone’s support, Pole for a Purpose is able to donate $5,500 to CASA St. Petersburg! Even better? Thanks to the Sonia Raymund Foundation, our donation is being matched dollar for dollar. That means CASA is receiving $11,000 because of this unique program!

Our 2015 donation specifically goes toward CASA’s new 100-bed domestic violence shelter. You can read about the shelter and all of its benefits by visiting the CASA website here.

Though Pole for a Purpose is a celebratory event, it is also important that we remind ourselves why we all come together for this common goal of helping others. As strong as Pole Dance has made us inside and out, there are others that are less fortunate and as a community we are so happy to be able to help those in need. Together, we are making a difference.

Stay tuned here on our website, our Facebook page, Instagram, and our new YouTube channel for updates on our 2016 show!