Karaoke Forums

Ever since entering this business I have had a weekend bar gig. Over the past couple of years I pulled out of doing my weekend gigs and hired a KJ to do the show. That way it leaves me open to accept private gigs as 3 bookings a month in private parties can equal 8 bar gigs in that same month.

This was a very good move for my business. Plus it gives me a much needed flexibility in my personal life. I actually can pick which weekend I want to go to the beach or go to the mountains for a little R&R.

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FlipSide Karaoke
Scott

Well, my fiance and I quit our regular gig about 3 weeks ago.  We had a really good thing going with lots of loyal customers, but the bar owner was trying to be an underhanded undercutter and do some things behind out backs.  We are friends with a girl who still works there as a cocktail waitress and she said business is HORRIBLE now.  She used to make $75-100 in tips for 4-6 hours PER NIGHT.   She told me she only made $72 COMBINED for FOUR Nights last week because all of the regulars don'[t come in any more.   This is actually the time of year here when bar business PICKS UP and they are dead now.  I think that while some bars can get by with crap entertainment because they are in a good location and have other things that keep them busy...for the most part people don't patronize businesses who do not TRY to show some sort of effort in being progressive with regards to keeping them as customers.  (For example, offering a good karaoke show)  Customers feel they are taken for granted when they see other clubs open up that are doing things to really try to get their business, and realize that they arje frequenting a club whose owner just ASSUMES the customers are going to stick around with no need to invest in their business to show customer appreciation.

I worked in this place for 8 months or so.  I got them to make many improvements, including putting a stage in for singers, a DJ booth, new mixer, new amp, new mics, mic stands,  AND I was getting paid to bring in MY own music and laptop.   They basically disrespected me and my value, so I walked on my own.  

Now they are back to using their own music selection (with NO plans to buy more) which consists of about 2000-2500 songs and nothing from the past few years unless a customer brought it and forgot to take it back home with them.  

Customers were like  "what the heck is this crap?"   The ironic part about it is that 75% of their business is military, and most of them have been exposed to karaoke overseas which pretty much has any song you could EVER want, and they put big money into it.   SO they KNOW what they are missing when they only get this (@$%&#!)  KJ with  2000 songs.

I

Bar owners don't respect the fact people get attached to their KJs especially if you
have been doing the same venue for years. Even if they replaced you with someone
who had the same equipment I think they would be hurting. It takes time to build a loyal following. I know most of my following comes from people who live near by, but they would follow me if I quit and worked somewhere else.

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[updown]~*~ MONKEY BUSINESS KARAOKE~*~ [/shadow][/updown][/glow]

You're right Babs--singers are very loyal to certain KJs, even bad ones!  There is a local guy whose show is terrible, bad sound, lousy rotation (He's even got it right in his songbooks that money taks and BS walks regarding rotation) and only one or two places that will hire him.  However, he has a group of very loyal customers that go to his show despitethe fact that there may be two better shows withing 5 blocks of the place where he's at.  Maybe it's because they are often the beneficiaries of his lousy rotation, I dunno.

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Spreading the karaoke gospel

I'm a newbie here and  a newbie to the KJ scene so this has been an interesting discussion for me.  Lots of good points and at least some indication that things around the country are in similar shape.

I've been a live-band musician for nearly 40 years.  About 2 years ago our band broke up.  The bass player and I (vocals & guitar) are now doing a duo show with karaoke as our "band".  I can't believe how well it has worked out despite the fact that it took a long time to really get comfortable playing with a "band" I couldn't see.  For the most part I'm working more than I ever have in my career and I'm making a lot more money.  The two of us normally get as much or more, sometimes a lot more, than our 4-piece band did.

The sad thing is that bar owners are kind of a breed apart from the rest of the business world.  I don't know why.  Some of them get jaded after a while from dealing with unreliable bands and I think that has hurt live music.  Some of them drink too much and some of them are just jerks.  In any case there are very few that one could consider to have a professional outlook on how they run their business.  

 But I think the biggest change I've seen is the demise of the club owner as a professional.  Most of them are just guys off the street who worked a job for a lot of years, put together a nest egg and bought a bar because that's where they spent most of their time anyway.  So they know little or nothing about promotion, advertising, or making an investment that will pay off in bigger profits for their business.  

In my corner of the world (Wisconsin) increasingly restrictive drunken driving laws have changed the bar scene considerably. It's too difficult to draw a crowd from a large metropolitan area due to the drinking laws.  Also, because of the laws, people don't follow bands, or KJs for that matter, like they used to.  It's mostly a neighborhood business these days.

In my area karaoke has never been a really big draw but there are places that have had it regularly and places that have experimented from time to time.  Based on the shows I've seen, pro KJs seem to be in the minority.  I think what you guys call the "undercutters" are probably the biggest influence.  In fact for quite a while I wondered what the draw of karaoke is (I'm a professional singer, wouldn't you think it was obvious?) because the shows I saw were overpopulated with drunks who couldn't sing when they were sober.  I didn't find that to be enteraining.

It wasn't until I saw a KJ who knew what he was doing that I discovered there are people who can sing well or at least can sing well enough who go to these shows and make them entertaining.

One of the stories I read in this thread was really familiar.  We recently lost a pretty lucrative gig at a local Moose Lodge to the guy who is running the organization this year.  It would have been each Friday and Saturday for 6 weeks.  He agreed to do it for $35 per night.  After the first night people stopped showing up and he ended up doing it for drinks.  On top of that he started his show when he wanted to and ended it when he wanted to.  The organization lost a lot of money because they didn't have quality entertainment during a period when they could have been selling booze all night to members from around the state.

One of my duo's regular venues started featuring karaoke once a month about a year ago.  They do it because they are friends of the KJs and it only costs them $100 per night.  This act does bring it's own crowd.  They are young, loud and very drunk.  So on karaoke night the regulars who are all in the 40+ range find someplace else to go.  The bar does great business from the karaoke crowd once a month but it's hurt in the long run because some of the regular crowd have permanently found somewhere else to go.  Yet because of that one night a month, it's tough to compete as an enterainer.  People like us and come to see us but they don't drink nearly as much as the kids on karaoke night.

Just recently I've started doing a few KJ gigs.  I had a chance to do it and decided that as long as I have the equipment and the discs I might as well try it.  I've been lucky because I know some people who can really sing and they enjoy the opportunity.  Thus far I haven't had to contend with too many of the drunks who are only at the mic because they've had enough liquor to dull their good sense.  So even though I've got a pretty good reputation, the money is not nearly what I can make with the duo.  $100 per night seems to be pretty standard in this area.

Larry

Larry,

You and I are working in virtually the same neck of the woods and I'm fairly familiar with the falls.  I think I've been to the show you are talking about!  I used to go sing there on Tuesday nights and the show was terrible.  The guy would put in regular music when people were waiting to sing, and his rotation was terrible.  The straw that broke this camel's back was when a girl I think he was trying to bag sang 4 songs between my first and my second.  However it was the only gig going in the area.  

I KJ full time in Ozaukee & Milwaukee counties and think that the $100 per show you are claiming is a little on the low side.  Not saying that there aren't people playing for that, but with a quality product you can attract a premium dollar!

In any case, please stop by and sing with me sometime--it'll be nice to meet someone from the boards here since I think I was the only Wisconsin guy around here since forever, while everyone else seems to hang out together regularly!  LOL

If you're interested, drop me an email and I'll be glad to send you a show schedule.

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Spreading the karaoke gospel

Larry, I love you man.    :worship:     A newbie with a brain.         This is what I've been talking about.      :hug:    :hi5: