What Many People Don’t Know About the Business of Being in a Band, and the Bars That Sometimes Hire Them
May 17, 2012 Leave a comment
These days, it’s common for many people to be playing music solely for “the music”. It’s also common for playing in a mediocre band to be “just a side thing” for its members. Both of these things, along with a trend toward simplistic music, and a consequent over-saturation of the market, have caused some major issues for any musician or band expecting to make any sort of decent income off of the thousands of hours of work that he or she has invested into learning an instrument.
First, I want to talk about why bar owners hire bands, (or why they should be hiring bands). Bands are generally hired to bring in a small crowd of drinkers, but they are mostly there to keep the crowd at that bar. If a band is entertaining, then the bar is more likely to retain customers throughout the night. So, while the draw is important, retention is important, too. This increases liquor sales, which ultimately increases revenue.
However, a problem arises when bar owners aren’t able to see the long-term investment in live entertainment. Firstly, they may see paying for a band, and having a poor turn out as A. the band’s fault, (it’s technically the venue’s responsibility to advertise the event, especially an event that’s out of town for the band) or B.A loss, and a reason to only accept charity bands (bands that have no problem doing it for free,) to play for them. They also may begin charging a cover, and paying the band only a portion of the cover that they receive.
This, however, is not only detrimental to local and small-time, working musicians as a whole, but it’s also not very good business or marketing. People are generally attracted to bars that have live music, (the Southgate House in Cincinnati proved this,) and if there is consistent, good entertainment (the kind that one has to PAY FOR,) then word will get out, and a strong customer base will follow. Furthermore, the nights that bands have retained an audience, or brought an audience easily offset the one night that everyone was probably home watching the Bengals play.
My hometown, Detroit, is an exceptional example of how this kind of attitude decays the quality of the music scene. If you want to go to Detroit, and expect to find good music, other than progressive Jazz downtown, then you’ll probably end up at DTE (formerly Pine Knob,) watching Ringo Starr and his All Star Band, as oppose to hanging out at a local dive, club, or small venue.
In the 7 years that I have been playing live shows, I have been paid a guarantee ONCE in Detroit. Actually, I take that back. I was guaranteed a certain amount of money, and when I played the show, the sleaze-bag owner informed me that he had fired the person who hired me, and they were only paying me $50, even though we made more than that in admission.
I want to get back to the point of “playing music solely for the music”. When a few bands start doing this, then a few bar owners start hiring those bands, and it causes a chain reaction. Bar owners seem to start to believe that they can save money by hiring musicians who aren’t actually working musicians. This lowers the quality of entertainment, and results in a bar full of the band’s friends and family members. The crowd who drinks excessively will go and sing karaoke, because if they want to hear horrible singing, then it might as well be their own. The crowd who enjoys culture and dancing, etc. will either go somewhere quiet where they can talk, or stay home and play Diablo III.
The way that refusal to pay for what is a SKILLED TRADE, (and for what, if done right, brings in significant money in revenues from liquor,) effects musicians is inconceivable to many people who have a romanticized view of the profession.
First, one must view a band as a business. There are obvious expenses, relating to fuel and wages, but there are also expenses related to marketing, CD production, equipment, repairs, vehicle depreciation, lodging, and meals. Sleazy Sal’s Midnight Dive Bar might think that $150 is plenty of money to give to a 4 piece band that over time has made them thousands of dollars in drinks by marketing the bar all over Facebook, bulletin boards, e-mail lists and to whoever will listen, (I’ll get to that in a few,) as well as bringing in, and retaining guests, but if you divide that $150 by four, deduct gasoline and marketing, (assuming it’s in town,) equipment expenses and repairs, and setting aside 15% (a tiny amount for any business) to build business assets, then Sleazy Sal just paid those musicians, at most, 3.02 an hour. Yay!
In regards to marketing, one must consider the fact that bars would have to pay out the ears for the kind of marketing that hiring just ONE band likely provides. The average reach of my band page is about 250 people per post. Multiply that by four, because I generally mention the details of upcoming shows about four times, and it’s easy to cover the, seemingly measly, 330 or so likes that I have. That may not seem like a lot, but 330 clicks from Google Adwords will run close to $500.
Furthermore, many of these bars are eternally (due to poor management and no marketing team) in what is called the brand non-recognition stage of marketing. That is, most people have neither seen, nor heard of the establishment. At this point, almost any advertising is good advertising. The goal is to raise awareness, and while doing so, make sure that the product or service that one is providing is of QUALITY. The QUALITY THAT PAID, LIVE ENTERTAINMENT INSURES. Not to mention the word-of-mouth publicity that it creates.
What do you hear more often? “I went to a bar and had a really good bud light,” or “I saw a really great band at _____ bar the other day”. To bar owners, I want to say this: UNLESS YOU ARE SELLING HARD-To-FIND CRAFT BEERS, THEN YOUR CUSTOMERS ARE COMING IN FOR THE ENVIRONMENT, NOT A BOTTLE OF BUD LIGHT THAT THEY CAN GET FOR 1/8th THE PRICE AT THE GROCERY STORE! It’s about the ENVIRONMENT, the AMBIENCE, and the ENTERTAINMENT.
That is all.
