The Busking Project CIC is an exciting arts nonprofit that offers a diverse range of services to support street performers — the arts industry's least-served entertainers. Street performance is both created by and enjoyed by a complete cross section of society. Buskers entertain the rich and poor, the differently abled, migrants, old and young people alike.
But today, street performance is seriously at risk. The coronavirus vastly accelerated the move away from physical cash, the world's cities have been cracking down on street performances, even before the associated lockdowns.
We give buskers access to cashless payments, and we help them to network, share resources and fight for their rights in countries all over the world. We have over 8,000 registered street performers in 120 countries, and are the only company that offers our services. In other words, we have huge brand recognition in a niche market.
We’ve built an events platform where people can find street performers to hire them, we have a digital product that enables tipping performers with Apple Pay, Google Pay and PayPal in the street, and we provide resources and information to further their career development, through two separate websites. We also do a range of advocacy work. Most recently, we supported the fight against anti-busking legislation in Westminster, and we’ve also helped advocates across Europe, North America, Australia and elsewhere with several significant successes. We’re just about to launch a new community website to help advocates to network, strategise, share resources and to educate the public and press.
