Flaky Performers

Yesterday was Saturday. It used to be such a huge day for me as I often would perform magic shows at 3-5 birthday parties every Saturday and usually another one or two on Sunday. I stopped advertising birthday parties about three years ago, when my daughter was 18 months old. I knew she would begin ballet, and have kindergarten plays, Girl Scout events, and other such weekend things that I wanted to be a part of.

I still do a few birthday parties each month but they are all repeats and referrals. I don't accept parties unless they've seen me perform before. This keeps most of my weekends open, but still allows me to go out and do a few birthday parties. I love doing them, I just like having family time on the weekends, too.

So anyway, I was surprised to have someone call me and ask me to help them out. It seems they got a call from someone who hired a magician who decided at the last minute not to show up. This guy was trying to help them out by locating a performer for them.

This used to get calls like this almost every Saturday. I often thought it would be a profitable business to run an ad that said "Don't Hire me! Just keep my number handy for when the guy you DO hire doesn't show up". I would imagine that a performer could keep very busy with nothing but this tag line.

Here's a little secret, if you care: You charge a fair price and then do what you promise. You answer the phone when you can and return calls promptly when you can't. You mail what you say you are going to mail and you show up when you say you are going to show up. You then do what you said you would do and voila! Before long you have a growing, viable business model.

Not much of a secret to success, is it?

But when you watch what so many others are doing, you would think it is a secret.

I recently met a guy who truly understands this. He acts as an agent for other performers and offers his customers a very unique guarantee. If one of his performers doesn't show up, not only do you NOT have to pay any fees, his company will actually PAY YOU the fee you were scheduled to pay.

While this is no substitute when you are a parent with a six year old who is crying because the magician never showed up at his party, it must seem rather reassuring to a client.