Any work coming in?

There's no DJ work. Go find something else to do that someone else values.

Did an online quizzo last night. it was a good time and had 85 people join. It was $10 a person to play. I took $150 and winner and runner up did an 80/20 split. Will be doing it again on Friday night and most likely do it twice a week until we are free again.

Booked a wedding this week, and I'm sending out a quote today for another. Surprisingly, I'm surviving.

For DJs: It's Time to move on from the lazy non essential easy gig life, and grab an important life essential job like Fry Cook, or Drive Thru Technician, or grocery store cashier, or perhaps Wal Mart or Amazon warehouse stock person if you enjoyed the lifting/loading/setting up aspect of being a DJ!

Party time is over. Time to be serious, and cover your face, wash your hands 47 times a day, and disinfect everything you touch. And stay 6 feet away from all other people! No more gatherings of people creating petri dishes, and certainly no more hand shaking, hugging or kissing...EEWW so gross! ...so being a DJ is over.

DJ Ricky B said:

...so being a DJ is over.

Click to expand...

For now....how long is anyone's guess... Once this gets resolved, there will be a pent-up demand.

Whoever can make it through will benefit.

Also they’ll probably will pick up some bargain priced gear soon...

My son has a wedding planned end of May. We are all in limbo.


GJ

rhythmgj said:

Also they’ll probably will pick up some bargain priced gear soon...

Click to expand...

Aaaahhh....good point...

rhythmgj said:

Also they’ll probably will pick up some bargain priced gear soon...

My son has a wedding planned end of May. We are all in limbo.


GJ

Click to expand...

My brother's wedding is May 30th. Up in the air at the moment. It looks more like they will cancel, and just elope though. They have until April 7th to make decision. Caterer claim's they need to know by that date. His wedding is at a rented beach house, not a normal venue. So it really is up to my brother and his GF. ...They are just mainly concerned about the older folks including my parents being able to make it. ...Well I suppose they do need the gatherings Ban to be lifted as well before May 30th if they plan to go through with it. ...Their wedding will only have 45 guests + them at the very most.

Since I am a part-timer, I can't imagine how badly this is affecting you full timers.
I see it with the boss of the production company I work for.
EVERYTHING he had (including installs) has been cancelled for the foreseeable future.
And he cannot collect unemployment, since he is the owner of his own biz.
If you work at almost any other business, you can be up-and-running as soon as this is over...
and start making money again.

Ausumm said:

Since I am a part-timer, I can't imagine how badly this is affecting you full timers.
I see it with the boss of the production company I work for.
EVERYTHING he had (including installs) has been cancelled for the foreseeable future.
And he cannot collect unemployment, since he is the owner of his own biz.
If you work at almost any other business, you can be up-and-running as soon as this is over...
and start making money again.

Click to expand...

While I've been moaning about my venue project, we have some long-time friends (here in Nashville), who just bought an existing venue. Just over a million dollars invested and the guy quit his job to focus on the venue. I have about 5-6 DJ gigs booked at their place this year with the first towards the end of April (still on the books but highly in question at this point). This couple is my age (mid-50s) and have risked everything they've built over the past 25 years. I can't imagine how much their butts are puckered up right now.

Jeff Romard said:

Depending on how they financed it could be costing a couple of hundred a day in interest alone

Click to expand...

They sold their personal residence and got some extra help from family. I'm really, really concerned for them and hope they can make it thru this first year. The good part is it's a high-end facility (historic mansion) and they're able to fetch $10k-$20k per wedding. They've already made some significant improvements to the property so even if they have to re-sell it, they'll likely make a profit on the transaction. I'm very, very concerned for my friends and hoping it works out.

I'm still getting inquiries. I'm either having a lower close rate, or it's taking couples longer to make a decision because the contracts aren't flowing at the moment.

It's certainly possible that other DJs are desperate to book stuff and are dropping prices making it harder for me to win at my regular rates. But the sample size isn't large enough to really know what's going on yet.

I am not changing rates, and have been increasing my reservation fee to $500 to try to boost the short term cash flow just a bit. My overhead isn't huge... small marketing budget and the payment on the van. Few music subscriptions that are no biggie. But I just wrote the check for my SEP IRA contribution from 2019, and also had a hefty tax bill. So cash is tighter than I wish it was.

Situation could be WAY worse, I'm still working my day job. But I had just recently committed to more home improvement work that I wish I could roll back right now.

And just like that the log jam breaks. 2 contracts going out today from the inquiries I've had over the last couple weeks.

Booked myself a triple header in October (23, 24, 25) which I'm sure will be exhausting.

We have had 4 inquiries in the last two weeks and one more today. I didn't expect any.

None have booked yet but they are positive leads.

Ausumm said:

Since I am a part-timer, I can't imagine how badly this is affecting you full timers.
I see it with the boss of the production company I work for.
EVERYTHING he had (including installs) has been cancelled for the foreseeable future.
And he cannot collect unemployment, since he is the owner of his own biz.
If you work at almost any other business, you can be up-and-running as soon as this is over...
and start making money again.

Click to expand...

The new stimulus allows for small nd self employed business owners aka the gig workers, to qualify for unemployment under the new guidelines. Up to $600 a week is what I'm seeing. Just waiting to see how to apply.

Personally, I've been fortunate with the timing of all this as I had taken March off for my newborn... had only 3 events in april due to catholic and orthodox easter,. May clients are still holding off but have some dates on hold with me.

New bookings are coming in as well. I've booked 3 weddings, 1 prom, and 1 sweet 16... but as ross said, there may be some tht are slower to respond. I have one wanting to hold off on the signing of the contract until all this ends to see if it changes anything in their lives dpeending on how long term it becomes.

Another source of inquiries for me has been postponements needing a dj since theirs was not available. Downside is... most of these are typical price conscious clients in desperation mode. For example all have had budgets of no more than $1200 with no add ons wanted... and one wanted add ons... but a budget of $3000... where what they wanted is normally $4500 through me.

If this is only a month or two, this will have no impact on me in any way as I'll either reschedule or make up the bookings in the second half of 2020. I currently have only 1 event for Nov and 2 for december meanign there are plenty of dates available to fill if necessary.

djtaso said:

The new stimulus allows for small nd self employed business owners aka the gig workers, to qualify for unemployment under the new guidelines. Up to $600 a week is what I'm seeing. Just waiting to see how to apply.

Click to expand...

Careful.
From what I have heard, the deal for small businesses is not unemployment,
it's a small business LOAN.
Perhaps that has changed in the new stimulus bill.

Just had a DJ+Photobooth inquiry last night for September. Was very glad to see it, given I have zero on the books for that month. The downside, I'm wondering how many of my now desperate competitors will be lowballing that same event.