Cowboy Church

I think this Cowboy Church is a great idea. Niche marketing is not just getting people through the doors of a church (or barn) who otherwise might never want to, it's going out into the world, meeting people where they are comfortable, and being Jesus with skin (or chaps) on.

Check out this article from the Denver Post:

"Cowboys are their own breed, but we're all more or less the same," Lipari said. "We all think our own way is the best way. Cowboy church fits my personality. It's laid back."

The church may be tailored for cowboys, yet ministers of the half dozen cowboy churches in Colorado report that more than half in attendance are city folk who just like cowboy culture or are seeking a return to rural roots.

In Colorado, the largest cowboy churches have a few hundred congregants, among them the Cowboy Church, where Lynette and Darin Gleghorn minister to 300 to 400 people in an indoor horse arena, northwest of Greeley, near Eaton.

"When Jesus was here he went to the seashore, the hillsides, and he met people where they were living and working," Orr says. "Cowboy church does the same thing."

The great insight of modern church marketing is that it is the women who want to go. Men don't," Twitchell said. "Anything that smacks of masculinity, like cowboy church or motorcycle church, has a real advantage."

For example, Pastor Larry Smith's congregation near Pueblo was dwindling when three years ago he renamed it the Wild West Cowboy Church, painted murals of ranch scenes on the walls and organized group horseback rides. Since then, the congregation has more than doubled to over 300, he said.

More HERE