"You Could Make a Lot More Money if You Booked Other People..."

I give all the props in the world to people that can stomach booking performers. The times I do it, it gives me an ulcer.

I hear this a lot. "The way to increase your income is to book overflow business using other performers."

I like the theory, I could also go back to school and become a doctor but neither really suits me.

I've booked other people. In fact, I was hired by a company in the Philippines, Jollibee Corporation to train mascot characters when they performed in the US. It was a big contract. I was sent to Manilla to meet with executives, went through the training, observed a lot of events to match what they did.

I was able to hire about 7 performers to do the costume work. It was a lot of fun to train them, get to know them...not so much fun to book them and keep them working.

At the same time, I figured I would become king of the clowns and use some of these same performers as birthday party performers.

Again, fun to get to know them, really great to train and create character. Not so much fun to book them, sell them on the phone, keep them busy.

I luckily eventually was let go by Jollibee, I don't know the reason but it was likely too expensive. They could just do it in house, no one cares that much about the quality of costume characters, except Disney. I love watching a good costume character work, it's like watching a good mime. That's why they hired me. Again though, it's a corporation and do they really need me after I've trained them? Not really.

I am a performer. I compare variety artists all the time to cats. We are very territorial, we do not like sharing, we will tollerate other cats (performers) but really at heart all we want to do is do our thing without comment, without interference with us having total and complete control.

Booking other people goes against that. I can't stand being responsible for other people. In my gut, I knew the only person I could count on to show up and do a good job was me. That's of course nonsense but that's the cat thing again.

So, yes, I made some more money. But what I discovered, I'm a performer, that's what I'm good at, that's all I want to do. That's a pretty keen insight. I went through the experiment and came out with that knowledge, that's pretty important.

Here is the other side of that, I'll write about this one sometime...I just absolutely love, adore, am enamored by teaching. It is a great joy to do and I don't get to do it nearly enough. That was the side I was drawn to when I booked other people.

As much of a cat as I am, I love watching people come to me, work with me and create a character that is all their own.

Anyway...

To all you clever relatives that keep telling me this, I know the business model, I tried it and hated it. If I'm broke, I'll eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, booking other performers is not for me.

Since I tried it, I'm the guy bookers want to work with because I get it!