Reasonable Prices

purpleeyedpig

New member
Hello all,

I'm new to the forum, so not yet sure of the ins and outs of it. If I make a faux par please bear with me! :)

Lately, I have been contacted by several people wanting to book a dancer (great!), except I am finding it difficult to set a price.

I do have a set price for several things, but these are straightforward, i.e. so much for a party, so much for so long a performance, etc.

However, one of the enquiries I received included a meet and greet from between 7pm - 8pm, followed by a performance at around 9.30pm. My difficulty with this is: how much should I charge for the hanging around? Should I charge for the hanging around? Considering that this means I would be out ALL evening and therefore unable to accept any other booking on that night, what is a reasonable price to charge?

What are your thoughts?

I always find it difficult to know what is a good price anyway, since I find myself comparing myself as a dancer to those around me (as I'm sure we all do). I'm not a professional dancer, therefore I feel that I can't ask the sometimes ridiculous amounts that are requested by those who are. Yet I still want to get paid for my time.

HELP!
 

Yame

New member
I always find it difficult to know what is a good price anyway, since I find myself comparing myself as a dancer to those around me (as I'm sure we all do). I'm not a professional dancer, therefore I feel that I can't ask the sometimes ridiculous amounts that are requested by those who are. Yet I still want to get paid for my time.

HELP!

If you're comfortable dancing for money you should be comfortable charging professional rates. The "ridiculous" amounts requested by the professionals in your area are the amounts they have likely agreed upon, and decided were fair amounts in order for them to be able to make a living dancing. You should stay within the agreed upon rates for your area, and if you don't think you're good enough to charge so much, then don't dance professionally at all.
 

AndreaSTL

New member
What Yame said.

As for the hanging around bit - yes, definitely charge. As you said, you will be there an entire evening so you are giving up the potential for earning additional income. Or the potential for hanging around the house in comfy clothes, which also has value. ;)
 

Kashmir

New member
As above. I occasionally explain to clients they aren't paying $X/hour - the cost includes time to prepare, travel - there and back, clean up - and thousands of hours of study and practice (not to mention ten of thousands in tuition). I usually don't point out their gig also means the hour before I start preparation is also usually stuffed - it is rare I can do paid IT work then - nor can I garden that day as I need my nails nice. Oh, and it stuffs your social life.

To repeat, don't undercut. If you don't think you are worth what the other dancers are charging then maybe you are not ready to do this.
 

Munniko

New member
You need to charge the professional rate not just because it is the agreed upon in your area, but if you undercut the other professionals in your area you run the extremely likely risk that you will be shut out of the community because of these practices. I definitely agree with everything that is said before.
 

Roshanna

New member
I always find it difficult to know what is a good price anyway, since I find myself comparing myself as a dancer to those around me (as I'm sure we all do). I'm not a professional dancer, therefore I feel that I can't ask the sometimes ridiculous amounts that are requested by those who are. Yet I still want to get paid for my time. HELP!

What Yame said!

If you are accepting paid gigs, which it sounds like you are fairly regularly, then you *are* a professional dancer whether you see yourself as one or not, and you need to stick to professional rates of pay and professional behaviour.

The rates may seem 'ridiculous' to you, but they reflect the realities of trying to make a living as a professional dancer, when you have lots of costs to cover, rent and bills to pay, and you can only physically do so many gigs per week, even if there is plenty of work available in the first place. It seems like in most places, the pay that professional bellydancers get is actually quite a lot lower than other entertainers/performers (fire dancers, clowns, jugglers...), mostly because there are so many dancers who are desperate to perform and who don't charge appropriately for their time (often because they don't need the money from dance to support themselves financially because they have a well paid day job or a husband who supports them, so they never see the true economic effect of undercharging).

I'd recommend taking a look at this page to get an idea of what you should be charging generally. Belly Dance Rates by Region | Samira Shuruk | Belly Dancer in Baltimore & Washington, DC

For meet & greet, I actually don't know what the going rate is, as I don't get many enquiries for this type of thing, and I tend to avoid this type of work because it's kind of awkward and boring just standing around and not actually dancing, plus costumes aren't exactly comfortable to stand about in, and I always worry about someone spilling a drink on me or something... Your best bet to find an appropriate rate is probably to search online for modelling rates (I think the right term might be 'ambiance models' or 'promotional models'). I don't think the pay for this type of work is usually very good, tbh. I had a quick look and found rates listed between $15 and $50 per hour, and as a dancer with your own costumes, I'd guess that you'd probably want to charge at the higher end of this as you have special skills & equipment.

Relatedly, the lowest pay I've ever accepted for my time is for fine art modelling, which has a going rate of £10 per hour (about $15? It's about half the rate that you get for photographic modelling) - but that is less stressful to me than promotional modelling as there's no awkward social interaction with the public, and I find it quite exciting to be the inspiration for a work of art!
 
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Darshiva

Moderator
I was paid $25/hour as an artist's model (life model) 15 years ago. I can only imagine that the rate has gone up for that. I'd definitely charge at least $50/hour for the waiting around and the pro rate for the performance.
 

Roshanna

New member
I was paid $25/hour as an artist's model (life model) 15 years ago

Hmm, interesting. I asked around a few life models I know, and they agreed that £10p/h was the going rate (though it may be higher if you're modelling for a life drawing class rather than for one artist?), though it does seem a bit on the low side to me. I think the rates must just be different on this side of the world...
 
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