I charge what I do because of a few reasons:
My version works this way:
1. I don't want to work with
the cheap budget clients unruly or problematic people.
My Days of doing $300 to $600 gigs
are long in the past. are typically a small but good opportunity to support an already good client or referral. I don't need every event I do to be of Olympic proportion. I measure the value of a client relationship rather than the specific event. If something being requested is properly priced at that level and that client or the client referring them has a history and/or future needs then I'm going to cement that relationship regardless of how it initially presents itself.
2. I don't make
know that it is a solid price in comparison to many other experienced DJ services. I am known for the reliable results I produce at any and every price.
by no means the most expensive. I am by no means cheap Price is generally not the deciding factor for my prospects,, I have already been recommended or referred and we are merely working out specific details. They may or may not even ask for the price before committing.
3.
I am doing less events by design. I
really don't want to pull
40+ 150 events events or more a year
any more. I
don't want to work more
than 30 often on weekdays now than I do Saturdays
a year moving forward, and I
will probably be am happy
if when I have work
ed I like doing
24 Saturdays a all year. I don't plan to slow down
book Fridays at all. I could book myself at $700 to $1,000 level and probably get my numbers back up to 40+ weekends a year moving into 2022
after the Pandemic, but I don't want to go that route. or anytime soon.
4. If I get into advertising again, then the world has developed mass amnesia. I haven't paid for an advertisement since 1994. Most of my clients run a color space add in their program books for me at no cost. The rest just seem to remember me and tell others.
I don't want my advertising to exceed 15% of my sales. In order for me to make a healthy profit if I do start advertising again, I pretty much need to be at my current price points.
5. If 2022 books completely or at least 90% of what I want
to do then I will be basically moving into the $2,000 realm for my popular wedding package going into 2023. If I don't do that, then I am still okay at my current prices. then I will change nothing - because I don't f** with some thing that's working.
Finally, I am the voice speaking to my own welfare. What others "look" to is not what motivates me and I
am in my 22nd year of deejaying, and 21 years since I started doing weddings. It would look strange if I advertised myself at say $550/4 hours, and $795/6 hours for weddings. That was the going rate in Maryland in like 2005. I don't want to say I have been deejaying for 21 years, but am charging like I am a newbie in 2021 and dishing out a 2005 price point am fine with looking strange if that is what you believe. If the bank should stop accepting my "strange" deposits I may then reconsider, but not before.
FYI: About 30 years ago I took on a semi-weekly series of $250-$300 local teen dances as a matter of community support. (They had trouble finding DJs because like Ricky, DJs wouln't do these modest gigs.) I considered each one of them to be a training exercise and approached them as if my livelihood depended on it. Anyone I sent to these gigs needed to be 120% on board with enthusiasm. On any date that I was available I did them personally, despite a full catalog of higher profile events. If I connect the dots originating from these teen centers an entire web of long standing clients with annual recurring event needs emerges with what amounts to roughly $1.2M - $1.6M in gross revenue received. That's what $300 could buy 30 years ago - and it is still true today.
I didn't succeed by being the best DJ available. I succeed by delivering reliable support to a community that in turn supported me and my business. I don't sell entertainment - I sell reputable, reliability and community engagement that just happens to come with a musical backing track.