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[Steve-White]

Me neither and somebody has to run sound for bar bands, maybe it is fun for weekend.  I know there is some folks here that enjoy it and seriously subsidize these efforts.

What it's not is a business model or even a gateway into the production business. 

I tried it an bought my way out, lol.  Of course that's a story still to be written if we make money in the end so what do I know?

I did ok doing club cover band stuff on a local basis.  Where I ran into problems was when I started working with acts showcasing.  Doing the LA showcasing scene back in the early 80's was a ton of fun - but, from a business perspective was a disaster for me.  When fun and reality crashed together it wasn't pretty.    After a night at Madam Wong's in Hollywood, the singer went ballistic in the parking lot when I asked for my $25 fee, the drummer and roadie took me to the bus station in LA and I headed back to Fresno that night.  They played the Troubadour the next night and couldn't find a decent engineer, I left them the mics and stuff I carried for showcasing.  The gig was a disaster and of course there was bad blood afterwards and it was all my fault.

Lesson learned - I'm not a band member that will be included in the cut when they "make it big".  I went into aerospace, they never went anywhere - that was the fundamental problem all along. 

[Luke Geis]

I think for the common ankle bitter it can be a great business model, for them......

Imagine working an 8-5 and having a meager $30k a year income. That works out to about $14 an hour for a 40-hour workweek. Let's say you happen to own a basic PA system for whatever reason ( like you used to be in a band ). Now you want more money and you have a flexible enough work schedule, or you are hungry enough to spend you weekends doing sound for bands. If they could manage 1 gig per week for the whole year that would mean an extra $7,800 of income at their lowest tier. If they averaged out at 1 gig per week at $200 per gig that would be an extra $10,400 a year! So an extra $10k per year is not a horrible income for something you do for fun on the weekends. This, of course, doesn't factor any costs related to making that income, but you are still coming out ahead if this is your story.

Now if you are someone like me and you ONLY do audio engineering for a living and $40k a year isn't going to cut it, then yeah, that model won't work. I am doing considerably better than that!!! I only got there because I realized many years ago that if I plan on doing this for another 20+ years, I better be making real money now, not in 20 years.

My aha came when I was at one point an ankle bitter working 6 days a week and only pulling in about $1k a week. Still a darn good income, but I was working all the damn time. I obviously wasn't keen on working 6 days a week for every week of the year. I had a similar case to the story above except my day job was working for an A/V company that really didn't do large productions or work weekends. I was also running sound at a venue 2 nights a week and had my own gigs on the weekends, holidays and other random days. So I was pretty damn busy, but I was getting tired of it and not making the money I wanted.

Around 2009 after the great housing bubble burst, the company I was at got slow and put me on part-time and by the end of the year, I was essentially on an as-needed basis. So I got busy freelancing to all the other A/V companies in the area and was again working pretty much all the time. This was fine and all, but around this time $150 was about as high a day rate as any company wanted to dole out in my area. So I was making pretty much the same overall income after all was said and done. As I started doing more of my own shows, I was already at the bottom and getting people to pay me what I really wanted and was worth, was hard. I wasn't doing any $150 setups, that's for sure, but I was having a tough time getting much more than about $500 for what I would charge around $1k for today. My big change of heart and what made me change my ways was around 2013 or so. I was asked to do a gig and was basically laughed at when I told them the price I wanted...... It was disheartening enough that I was already about half what a larger house would charge, so to be told I am not worth that price really pissed me off. After that, I decided that I wouldn't deal with that anymore and I was going to charge real money and if you didn't like it, tough noodles. I had a really rough couple of years after that needless to say. I worked part-time for a Segway tour company as a mechanic for supplemental income as my freelance work dried up after increasing my rates and telling a couple of vendors I was not available. I focused on my own clientele and getting gigs that paid me what my service was worth. Low and behold by 2016 I was back to full-time audio engineering and with just my own shows alone, it was enough to cover my needs and any freelancing I did was cake money. The challenge for me came when my freelance work started to outpace my own work. Last year I worked 250 or so days, of which about 175 was freelancing and 75 were my own gigs. I was becoming inundated with work, now averaging about 4-5 days a week! It was starting to get in the way of my own stuff ( which makes me more money ). So this year I cut back a couple of vendors I freelance for and am leaning on one or two of the others to sling more work my way ( at a new higher rate!!!! ) or simply do more of my own gigs. I am looking for a work-life balance basically. Extra income is just a reward for my hard work and spending as much of my free time as I can advancing in this field.

What baffles me, is that today, there are those willing to provide this service at such a low rate! I was getting that much 15 years ago to provide nearly half the amount of stuff. I want to say that around 2009 I was pretty much setting right around $350 for that level of service. While I can empathize with them for that level of competition, I also know that the cream rises to the top and that if you place a hard value on your work, you will get it once others see that value too. I think for many of the " ankle bitters " it is simply not knowing what the service is truly worth and anything is generally better than nothing. The race to the bottom is real.

[Tim McCulloch]

I think for the common ankle bitter it can be a great business model, for them......

Imagine working an 8-5 and having a meager $30k a year income. That works out to about $14 an hour for a 40-hour workweek. Let's say you happen to own a basic PA system for whatever reason ( like you used to be in a band ). Now you want more money and you have a flexible enough work schedule, or you are hungry enough to spend you weekends doing sound for bands. If they could manage 1 gig per week for the whole year that would mean an extra $7,800 of income at their lowest tier. If they averaged out at 1 gig per week at $200 per gig that would be an extra $10,400 a year! So an extra $10k per year is not a horrible income for something you do for fun on the weekends. This, of course, doesn't factor any costs related to making that income, but you are still coming out ahead if this is your story.

Now if you are someone like me and you ONLY do audio engineering for a living and $40k a year isn't going to cut it, then yeah, that model won't work. I am doing considerably better than that!!! I only got there because I realized many years ago that if I plan on doing this for another 20+ years, I better be making real money now, not in 20 years.

My aha came when I was at one point an ankle bitter working 6 days a week and only pulling in about $1k a week. Still a darn good income, but I was working all the damn time. I obviously wasn't keen on working 6 days a week for every week of the year. I had a similar case to the story above except my day job was working for an A/V company that really didn't do large productions or work weekends. I was also running sound at a venue 2 nights a week and had my own gigs on the weekends, holidays and other random days. So I was pretty damn busy, but I was getting tired of it and not making the money I wanted.

Around 2009 after the great housing bubble burst, the company I was at got slow and put me on part-time and by the end of the year, I was essentially on an as-needed basis. So I got busy freelancing to all the other A/V companies in the area and was again working pretty much all the time. This was fine and all, but around this time $150 was about as high a day rate as any company wanted to dole out in my area. So I was making pretty much the same overall income after all was said and done. As I started doing more of my own shows, I was already at the bottom and getting people to pay me what I really wanted and was worth, was hard. I wasn't doing any $150 setups, that's for sure, but I was having a tough time getting much more than about $500 for what I would charge around $1k for today. My big change of heart and what made me change my ways was around 2013 or so. I was asked to do a gig and was basically laughed at when I told them the price I wanted...... It was disheartening enough that I was already about half what a larger house would charge, so to be told I am not worth that price really pissed me off. After that, I decided that I wouldn't deal with that anymore and I was going to charge real money and if you didn't like it, tough noodles. I had a really rough couple of years after that needless to say. I worked part-time for a Segway tour company as a mechanic for supplemental income as my freelance work dried up after increasing my rates and telling a couple of vendors I was not available. I focused on my own clientele and getting gigs that paid me what my service was worth. Low and behold by 2016 I was back to full-time audio engineering and with just my own shows alone, it was enough to cover my needs and any freelancing I did was cake money. The challenge for me came when my freelance work started to outpace my own work. Last year I worked 250 or so days, of which about 175 was freelancing and 75 were my own gigs. I was becoming inundated with work, now averaging about 4-5 days a week! It was starting to get in the way of my own stuff ( which makes me more money ). So this year I cut back a couple of vendors I freelance for and am leaning on one or two of the others to sling more work my way ( at a new higher rate!!!! ) or simply do more of my own gigs. I am looking for a work-life balance basically. Extra income is just a reward for my hard work and spending as much of my free time as I can advancing in this field.

What baffles me, is that today, there are those willing to provide this service at such a low rate! I was getting that much 15 years ago to provide nearly half the amount of stuff. I want to say that around 2009 I was pretty much setting right around $350 for that level of service. While I can empathize with them for that level of competition, I also know that the cream rises to the top and that if you place a hard value on your work, you will get it once others see that value too. I think for many of the " ankle bitters " it is simply not knowing what the service is truly worth and anything is generally better than nothing. The race to the bottom is real.

Luke, spot on.  For those that tl;dr... the Reader's Digest Version:  If you raise your rates and don't get them, it's either bad market timing or you're probably not worth what you were getting already.  If it's bad market timing, and you're worth it, you'll get your rate eventually.

It took me too long to get an actual dollar amount in my head for the value I provide to my various free lance clients.  A decade ago I raised my rates and nobody noticed except one client, who called me and told me I was working cheap enough that his superiors were concerned about the quality of service.  I sent a "corrected estimate" .  If they don't notice an increase, I didn't raise it enough.   While I fully understand that working for less is better than not working... go back to the RDV, above.

I love music.  My fortune cookie "fortune" the other day was "Your love of music will take you far."  It has, in many ways besides amplifying it, but music only pays well for a relatively small number of folks.  There are lots of ways to make money in audio but the stable ones are not glamorous and the glamorous are not stable (see up lighting and pipe and drape discussion elsewhere...).  Accepting that difference early and using it to ones advantage is a great help to long term prosperity.

[Steve M Smith]

Who cares about those people 98% of cover bands playing in bars are a total pain in the ass anyway.  That's a made up number BTW like 4 out of 5 dentists but arguments are far more compelling with made up statistics.

It's a well known fact that 87.3% of statistics are made up.


Steve.

[Tim McCulloch]

It's a well known fact that 87.3% of statistics are made up.


Steve.

There are three kinds of lies:  lies, damn lies, and statistics.

[Steve Garris]

You say that as if it is a bad thing 

Exactly. My business model is exactly that - gigs that are fun only. I only mix cover bands in local clubs that are a 10 minute drive from my house. I walk in and mix for $200/night and free beer. The clubs are packed and the bands are very good. Everyone knows me and I make them all sound great. I rent these same bands PA & lights for their private shows at $500-$700 (local only). I quit doing $300 shows a little over a year ago, and made more side-money last year, not less. I have a descent day job working from home that pays my bills, so this is a hobby job for me. Aside from wanting to buy a Danley rig (like Debbie) I'm very satisfied and have no intentions of expanding. I pay liability insurance and taxes on my money earned. Am I a bad person for running my ankle-biting business like this?

[Steve-White]

Exactly. My business model is exactly that - gigs that are fun only. I only mix cover bands in local clubs that are a 10 minute drive from my house. I walk in and mix for $200/night and free beer. The clubs are packed and the bands are very good. Everyone knows me and I make them all sound great. I rent these same bands PA & lights for their private shows at $500-$700 (local only). I quit doing $300 shows a little over a year ago, and made more side-money last year, not less. I have a descent day job working from home that pays my bills, so this is a hobby job for me. Aside from wanting to buy a Danley rig (like Debbie) I'm very satisfied and have no intentions of expanding. I pay liability insurance and taxes on my money earned. Am I a bad person for running my ankle-biting business like this?

You're fine.

Working part time by choice and paying taxes and insurance isn't the essence of a true "ankle biter".  Dump the insurance and go cash only - no taxes. 

[Steve-White]

Luke, spot on.  For those that tl;dr... the Reader's Digest Version:  If you raise your rates and don't get them, it's either bad market timing or you're probably not worth what you were getting already.  If it's bad market timing, and you're worth it, you'll get your rate eventually.

It took me too long to get an actual dollar amount in my head for the value I provide to my various free lance clients.  A decade ago I raised my rates and nobody noticed except one client, who called me and told me I was working cheap enough that his superiors were concerned about the quality of service.  I sent a "corrected estimate" .  If they don't notice an increase, I didn't raise it enough.   While I fully understand that working for less is better than not working... go back to the RDV, above.

I love music.  My fortune cookie "fortune" the other day was "Your love of music will take you far."  It has, in many ways besides amplifying it, but music only pays well for a relatively small number of folks.  There are lots of ways to make money in audio but the stable ones are not glamorous and the glamorous are not stable (see up lighting and pipe and drape discussion elsewhere...).  Accepting that difference early and using it to ones advantage is a great help to long term prosperity.

Luke hit it for sure, that's my story.  Back in the mid-80's while in college I was doing small sound & light work and some DJ shows.  For the DJ shows my price was $250 which was a low to mid-tier rate.  A colleague was charging $400 for wedding receptions.  He told me I was working for too little and should raise my rates.  With butterflies in my stomach, I started quoting higher and higher over a period of about 6 months and worked my way up to $400 for a 4 hours of dance music + dinner music (they provide dinner for me and roadie).

Having contracting experience in landscaping maintenance as a sideline back in the 90's, I solidified something I had learned doing sound/light/DJ work.  There's three basic tiers to work within based upon capability - low, mid & high.  It's that simple.  Ya wanna be mid-high tier.  That means for the most part better clientele, better working conditions and such - there are jobs I just wouldn't entertain doing.  When I started I took them all and so began the learning process.

I had no concept of what a business model was - no liability, no taxes.  We used to joke about a slogan being "Take the money and run".  So, I guess that makes me a REFORMED ankle biter!  My name is Steve and I'm a recovering Ankle Biter.  ROFL. 

[Debbie Dunkley]

I'm a bit like Steve. Because Chris and I met in band many many years ago and playing and singing music has always been part of our lives,  I never really ventured out into the 'big time' SR wise. We run and/or are involved with a few local bands at any given time and the SR comes with that as a package. This limits what I can charge especially when the bands play small venues. We do get offered nice shows from time to time and we are well equipped to provide for those.
If I charged what the Big Boys charge and limited myself to bigger better paying shows, it would impede what Chris and I love to and and that is play music TOGETHER (just like we did years ago when I was younger and I was on stage with him).
We pay taxes and we carry $1m liability insurance plus equipment insurance. It makes a HUGE dent in what we do earn but we do it right. Chris and I have said we will continue to do this until we can't....

[Tim Weaver]

I've had to turn down so many people looking for cheap to free PA or techs. Often I tell them, "if I blow a tire on the way to this gig I'll be loosing money" and then I let that sink in for a little bit. I won't even go do a briefcase gig for less than what some of our local ankle biters charge for full production.

[ProSoundWeb Community]