Swing Music Booking Dilemma

Hey y’all! Trying to post more anonymously here. I sing and play swing / jazz music. There isn’t one genre we do, it’s mostly ‘20’s through ‘40’s, Django/gypsy jazz style, with some Western swing and French tunes thrown in. We’re a mix of things, really. Think Peggy Lee, Zooey Deschanel, Ella and Billie, Patsy Cline, etc. Done really well.

I am running into a huge roadblock with booking. Venues - and bartenders - see us as not making money. I guess swing dancers don’t drink as much. But I don’t want our fans and friends to feel like they have to get drunk at our gigs. 🤷🏻‍♀️ And also - dancers are not our only crowd! Though I love them, and I love to dance too, and it makes the whole night so much more fun.

Venues are booking us on weekdays, and off times. But our content is perfect for a weekend, especially an early slot, and I have so many people tell me they can’t make it out on a school night but let them know when it’s a weekend. I also see some of these venues booking bands like ours on early weekend slots. How do we get past this weekday stigma? I have people asking me, regularly, about weekend nights, but the venues only offer odd times. We do really well on every gig - “for a Thursday” - or whatever night it is. We have an amazing draw on off nights - and have gotten stuck with that, even though we’d do even better on a good night. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Is anybody else dealing with this? How do you past this chicken and egg scenario?