Created Sep 23, 2026
Planning Your Christmas Show: What to Do and When
Planning Your Christmas Show: What to Do and When
Somehow, the end of one of the busiest periods of the year (back to school, back to classes and welcoming new starters) marks the beginning of another.
You've barely settled back in after the summer, and suddenly Christmas is looming. There's a venue to think about, costumes to order, choreography to finish, tickets to sell and a steady stream of questions from parents. And somewhere amongst all of that, you're still trying to make sure the new students who joined in September actually stay.
The good news is that a Christmas show follows a fairly predictable pattern. Get the important jobs done in the right order and December becomes much more manageable.
Late September: get the date in parents' diaries
If your venue is already booked, the most useful thing you can do now is tell your families when the show is happening.
Parents are planning Christmas too: holidays, visits from grandparents, school events and whatever else December decides to throw at them. The sooner your show is in the diary, the better.
Of course, the moment you announce the date, the next round of questions begins:
- What time is it?
- How many performances are there?
- How many tickets can we have?
- When do tickets go on sale?
You don't need every detail finalised, but you do need a rough idea of capacity. How many performers do you have? How many aunties, uncles and cousins twice removed are likely to want tickets? And can your venue actually fit them all?
Our venue capacity calculator can help you work out whether one performance is enough. If you're still deciding, we've weighed up the pros and cons in Should You Run One Show or Three?, and our post on how many tickets each family should get will help you land on a fair allocation.
For families who have only just joined you, clear and early communication is also a reassuring first impression of your studio. Not sure what to send and when? Our parent communication timeline builds an email schedule working back from your show date.
Early October: get costumes and props moving
Christmas has an irritating habit of making perfectly normal things take longer. Stock disappears, delivery networks get busier and "3–5 working days" starts to feel more like an optimistic suggestion than a promise.
So if you haven't ordered costumes and props yet, early October is the time to get moving, particularly for anything made to order, personalised or coming from further afield.
It also gives you some breathing room for the inevitable surprises: wrong sizes, missing items, or something red arriving in green. Much better to discover that in October than three days before the show.
If parents are contributing towards costumes, make the payment deadline clear too, so you're not left covering the costs while payments trickle in.
October: get your tickets on sale
By this point you've got a date, a venue and, fingers crossed, some red costumes making their way towards you.
Parents, meanwhile, have one more question:
"When can we get tickets?"
There's something reassuring about having the ticket sitting on your phone. Grandparents can be told, Christmas plans can be made, and nobody needs to wonder whether they've actually got a place.
Selling early also lets you see how quickly each performance is filling and whether one needs an extra push. Better still, ticket revenue starts coming in before show day, when plenty of your costs have already been going out.
One option is ticketing manually.
Spreadsheets. Bank transfers. Parents to chase. Seat numbers written on scraps of paper and stored somewhere so safe they're never seen again. What joy!
It's enough to make you wish October never existed.
That's exactly why we built Stage Stubs. Parents can book and pay online, receive their QR code tickets straight away, and you can keep track of every sale without manually joining all the dots. All at no cost to you.
If your venue uses reserved seating, we can also create a bespoke seating plan for you for free. If you're unsure whether allocated seating is worth it, have a read of Seating Plans vs No Seating Plans.
Before tickets go live, make sure you've decided on:
- Your prices, including any different ticket types
- Your seating arrangement, reserved or unreserved
- Any family ticket limit, so allocations stay fair
- Your on-sale date, so parents know when to be ready
Then let parents know in advance.
December: make show week boring
The best shows take you on a journey. The best show weeks do not!
The aim isn't to come up with clever new ideas but to make sure everything you decided earlier in the term actually happens.
A few days before the performance, send parents one clear reminder with everything they need:
- Arrival time
- Drop-off and collection arrangements
- Costume requirements
- Anything the audience needs to know
Then resist the temptation to send six more messages containing six different bits of information.
On the day, keep front of house simple. Every Stage Stubs ticket has its own QR code, and more than one person can scan tickets at once if you have a larger audience. Our post on getting your audience seated fast has more tips for a smooth door.
Then the curtain can actually go up on time. A Christmas miracle.
After the curtain comes down
Thank your performers, teachers, backstage helpers, and the parents who have spent the past few months hunting down costume pieces and driving to classes.
Then make a few notes about what worked and what you'd change next time. Was the venue the right size? Did you need more performances? What caused the most stress? Your future self will be grateful when planning starts again next year. For the full list, see our post on everything to do once the curtains close.
And once that's done?
Have a proper Christmas break. You've earned it!
Ready to get your Christmas show on sale?
Create your free Stage Stubs event, set up your performances and ticket limits, and let parents book and pay online while you get on with rehearsals. If it's all starting to feel like a lot, our free event planning tools cover everything from intermission lengths and recital budgets to planning checklists and volunteer rotas.
