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Al Angello Eternal Order Collegeville, Pa. USA 11045 Posts |
I feature a dynamite show that needs no hype to sell it. This whole concept makes the magician look like a huckster instead of an entertainer.
Al Angello The Comic Juggler/Magician
http://www.juggleral.com http://home.comcast.net/~juggleral/ "Footprints on your ceiling are almost gone" |
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MichaelDouglas Special user Portland, Oregon 766 Posts |
I approach goodie bags with these thoughts:
1) added convenience for the parents - they don't have to make bags 2) more fun for the kids - I include really cool stuff 3) take-aways with my contact info for spin-off bookings - it does happen 4) increased profit I include 8 goodie bags with the cost of my standard show. Most parties have over 8 guests, so I have a chance to upsell more bags at $4.50 each. Those upsells happen about 25% of the time. If they book higher value party packages then they get more goodie bags included plus other stuff. Sources: Orientaltrading.com for the bags. Office Max or Staples for the lables with my info. ezmagicrobbins.com for the bulk magic tricks (include one trick per bag) Dollar Tree & 5 Below for toys & activity booklets to include Sam's Club for bulk candy (no chocolate or nuts) I include a line in my performance agreement that mentions they get 8 goodie bags with the cost of the STANDARD show and additional bags will be available upon request. I also mention that the goodie bags include small parts that may be a hazard for children 4 and younger and should be distributed only at the parent's discretion. The materials I include cost me from a few pennies each (e.g. bulk fortune fish, Jumbo Magic Dollar Bill) up to magic drawer at .75 each. Tricks may be a ball & vase, vase & rope, coin vanisher, bill to water, finger chopper, etc. The bags are not all the same. My cost averages $1.75 per bag My phone script includes a line after I describe the show that goes something like "and that's not all. Next, I ask the kids if they all like getting prizes too? ...I tell the kids that Mr. & Mrs. Smith have arranged for all of you to get some Magic Goodie Bags." I then hand the bags to the parent. At that point the kids attention follows the parent with the goodie bags and gives me a quick second to close up my case before I get a bum rush by the youngsters to peer into my secrets. I hope this helps, and good luck. |
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Howie Diddot Inner circle San Francisco & Los Angeles California 3288 Posts |
Great ides Michael,I have not included the eight free bags and the upcharge in the paragraph about the goddie bage in my memo to the parents,
I'll do that today Thanks!!! |
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RLEPREE New user 4 Posts |
If you are not upselling, you are missing out on a great extra revenue stream.
I don't perform anymore, but when I did I would offer a custom magic kit for the birthday child and 12 magic themed goody bags for the kids. If they needed extra, they were only $2.00 each. The kit cost me $6.00 and the goody bags less than $1.00 a piece. This was a $50.00 add on and 75% of the time they would take it. It's a business and you should maximize your profits. |
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Al Angello Eternal Order Collegeville, Pa. USA 11045 Posts |
How about paper goods?
how about baking a cake? how about making a pizza? how about wrapping the presents? how about sending out the inviting? how about renting the hall? How about coming a day early to decorate? How about making Pinata's? How about giving up magic and becoming a **** concierge? If you guys want to run a party store why did you become magicians? All this crap just serves to cheapen our art. I show up after the kids eat, do a dynamite 45 minute show, and I'm off to the next party in one hour, with a check in my pocket. When it fits I do BOR, and that is it.
Al Angello The Comic Juggler/Magician
http://www.juggleral.com http://home.comcast.net/~juggleral/ "Footprints on your ceiling are almost gone" |
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keeblem Inner circle Essex, UK 1167 Posts |
Quote:
On 2012-01-25 22:38, Al Angello wrote: I can't see how party bags are any different from BOR. To say it cheapens our art is ridiculous. It's great advertising, benefits our customers and maximizes profits. Why not do it? I never push party bags - but the option is there if customers want them. Mark |
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Leland Inner circle St Louis 1180 Posts |
I make extra cash from goodie bags. You do have to keep in mind the age group that will receive the bag and fill them accordingly.
I did learn not to have any type of ball in the bag. They go crazy throwing them around and chasing after it. Not good for crowd control.
Life of Magic!
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Al Angello Eternal Order Collegeville, Pa. USA 11045 Posts |
I make much more money from multiple bookings, and I'm also able to maintain a degree of self respect, and professionalism.
Al Angello The Comic Juggler/Magician
http://www.juggleral.com http://home.comcast.net/~juggleral/ "Footprints on your ceiling are almost gone" |
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keeblem Inner circle Essex, UK 1167 Posts |
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On 2012-01-26 08:27, Al Angello wrote: You're right, Al. I lost all self respect when I started offering party bags. I feel worthless and cheap! I'm going off now to do 100 x charlier cuts to make myself feel like a real magician again! Mark |
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A Show By Joe Elite user Long Island 405 Posts |
I think that today, people don't have the time they use to. If you can offer goody bags with a magic theme, it will go over well with most. Also, it is a great way of giving out your card. It will give a feeling of completing the experience of your show. I think one mention of the bags is enough.
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Chris Capstone Regular user Tulsa, OK 107 Posts |
Greetings Al! I would say that goodie bags are just an added product/service a magician can provide to busy parents.
I offer my own customized kits because it gives me a chance to have every kid at the party take something home with my name and logo on it. I think having my own customized party favor magic kits with my logo makes me look more professional. I've heard that others like David Copperfield and Lance Burton have done the same thing at their shows. But what do they know? Why just yesterday I was speaking with a gentlemen in our industry about a new design for my kits. He was telling me about a design he had recently done for another amateur by the name of Duane Laflin. All kidding aside Al, I'm just baffled by your strong reaction to a rather benign idea. It goes without saying that kits or goodie bags should look professional, be a fair value for clients, and be offered to clients in a professional manner. It's just another form of BOR. I am certainly not an "armchair" magician. I'm a full-time professional and have several full-time pro friends in the busieness who also offer kits or bags. Some of them would probably not take kindly to being called names by the likes of you. (I on the other hand am much more charitable and understanding about such things.) Maybe you should reconsider your remarks. If you truly believe selling kits or bags is not right for your business, then fine. But it might not be a good idea to make blanket insults about everyone else in our industry who does. To all of you reading this thread who are relatively new to the business please take much of what you read on these forums with a grain of salt. Especially when it comes to what constitutes ethical or professional business pratcices. I've attached a couple of pics showing the front and back of my kits. I "huckster" them to poor unsuspecting parents for the exorbitant price of $3.00 each. My cost is about $1.70. For all you math challendged "knuckleheads" that's an obscene profit of...$1.30. Which is why I will be a proud member of the 1% in no time! BWAAAAHAAAAHAAAA! Click here to view attached image.
Chris Capstone
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Chris Capstone Regular user Tulsa, OK 107 Posts |
Chris Capstone
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MichaelDouglas Special user Portland, Oregon 766 Posts |
Great post Chris Capstone. The bag you offer looks very professional. I see some smart marketing by having your packaging refer them to your site for more magical items....very smart.
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Chris Capstone Regular user Tulsa, OK 107 Posts |
Thanks Michael, I guess it's smart but...when I designed the package I had the idea to have a shopping cart page that they could link to from my home page, but I haven't gotten around to getting it done. Every once in a while I get an email from somone wanting to buy tricks and I send them a reply with pics and prices.
In a way I'm kind of glad now that I didn't do the shopping cart page. I 've changed my mind on it. I now think it will be better to offer the additional tricks free as an incentive for doing something like writing a review or liking me on my facebook fan page. I haven't decided for sure yet. Maybe you have an idea? I'm also considering making the kits part of the price of my birthday show. Maybe I'll include up to 20 kits and only charge for additional ones. What do you think? I'm not having a problem selling them now, I'm just thinking it will be more percieved value to include some in the price.
Chris Capstone
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MichaelDouglas Special user Portland, Oregon 766 Posts |
Chris
On the Bags I think it's great to include them in your price. In addition to a great show, I feel it helps differentiate me from other guys around town. Of course, I adjusted my price to absorb this expense. However at times I talk with parents with a tight budget. I don't advertise this, but if the show seems to be at risk of being lost, I'll offer them my economy show. This is my standard show without the goodie bags, gift for the bday kid, etc. I only include 8 bags with my standard bday package. Generally there are more than 8 kids at a party and this influences the parent to buy some extra bags, or upgrade to a different bday show package that includes more bags. On the additional tricks I like Dean Hankey's mantra of building loyalty by giving away free stuff. With that said, I'd lean towards giving away a downloadable .pdf or video file that teaches a trick. This is a feature I plan to also implement at some point. I've been in the habit of sending a gift from the "$5 Below" store when clients sent back written feedback. With a download I could save that expense. Wishing you the best.... |
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Chris Capstone Regular user Tulsa, OK 107 Posts |
Great ideas Michael, Thanks for contributing something positive to the discussion.
Chris Capstone
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Tony Chris V.I.P. Vancouver, Canada 714 Posts |
Hey guys, some very interesting and useful tips here for goody bags/ magic kits. Some really good advice indeed. I currently do offer "loot bags or magic kits" and have on and off for the last 15 years. In the last few years I did something that I will share with you all now. For me it has been a marketing winner 100%. It is an idea that I came up with about 4 years ago and will be discussed on one of my upcoming "birthday party magic" for children's dvd's but I thought I would share it with you here first.
When I receive an inquiry for a birthday show, I pitch my show accordingly to my game plan. Once that is over, I very casually mention that I also offer a magic kit/loot bag that is completely magic in theme and tell the parent the cost is $5.00 per bag. Like many of you, I also make the kit look as attractive as possible. Each kit includes 3 magic tricks that are age appropriate. I order all of my tricks in bulk from Loftus at http://www.loftus.com and also have some some of my custom original kids magic tricks made in overseas for very little cost in bulk. I also include my coloring sheet that rolls into a magic wand and it also has some additional impromptu magic trick instructions on the back and probably the most important piece, a fridge magnet with my colorful logo, website and contact info. Here is the best part! On the fridge magnet is an almost exact replica of my website address. It differs only in the domain name slightly but when they go to the site it is almost a spitting image of my main site. The phone number is also different than my main phone number and is actually a "smart ring" phone line ($5.00 a month) When calls come in on that line, it is a double ring and I know instantly that they are inquiry calls from the fridge magnets that come from the loot bag. Here is why I do this. When I get calls on that smart ring line, I know it is a birthday party inquiry from my fridge magnet or from the magic loot kit cover which also has my second website and smart ring number, I am able to track every single inquiry now from my loot bag give aways as opposed to calls from my normal contact magic hotline that may come from a google search, referrals, repeats and even yes, my yellow pages ad. Yup, I still use the YP ad but it is a simple line ad these days that costs very little. It really just allows me to chat the parent up regarding my loot bags in my sales pitch because, you guessed it, she is already calling me from a number that was in the loot bag to begin with and that allows me to really up-sell it even more at that point. The mom has her child want me for their birthday party and I remind them about the loot bags in the sales pitch too. It really makes a difference to me to know how I am acquiring my birthday bookings and I can tell you all that in my own personal experience, Loot bags or magic kits really do pay off and earn me a ton of work. You may wonder though why I would go through all this trouble when I could easily just have the loot bags and fridge magnet have my regular contact info and website. I do it because it simply started as a marketing experiment to see if would work. Nothing more than that. The second phone line costs very little as mentioned and the extra website is very inexpensive too at only $25 per year to renew it. This is only my opinion of course but as a full time professional for the last 15 years and supporting my wife and too kids solely from magic, these little extra selling goodies really ad up every month. The cost for one magic kit/loot bag is about $1.27. I charge $5.00 per unit. In a party of 15 kids, that's an extra $55.00 per show. I devote one day every 3 or 4 months putting the kits together, along with my wife and we have it down to a fine science. We can make about 700 magic kits up in one day. Not everyone of course will buy them but it is a wonderful ad on and has made a difference for me in this recession time. I do not have the luxury of a spouse who works and brings in a second income. My wife and I have to raise both our children together as some of you may know, they both have autism and it really is a full time job just to raise two kids with special needs in our home. So I am left with either getting a day job (nothing wrong with that, did for many years) or trying to reinvent my income potential doing birthday parties. Anyhoo, everyone has their own opinions on this subject and I will only comment on my own experience. Chriscapstone - Awesome pics. Very sharp looking. Michael Douglas - Really solid advice. PS, my birthday show is bullet proof and I would never feel that I am cheapening my performance with an up sell for goody bags or trying to compensate for a weak performance. This is a business 100% for me and has been since I went full time professional around 1997 and I will do whatever it takes to make sure my mortgage,car payments tons of bills extra therapist costs are paid every month. I will do whatever it takes for my kids and family to never go without. If that means trying to sell a few goody bags whenever I can, I will do it till my very last children's show. I will even dress in a in a lobster costume at a customer appreciation day at a yacht club for 5 hours doing roving magic in the sweltering Vancouver Summer heat if it earns me a good keep. Not saying I have ever done that of course or have I???
As magicians we create what onlookers call magic. If they truly believe in what we have created for them to witness then magic is real!!!
- TONY CHRIS, A.K.A. Zany Zack http://www.tonychris.com |
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MichaelDouglas Special user Portland, Oregon 766 Posts |
Tony, I Loooooove the fridge magnet idea. I've been in lots of homes where there's a variety of those things dotting the fridge. Also thanks for the Loftus link. I've not known of them until now. Lastly, I really admire your "whatever it takes" attitude to generate income for your family.
Oh...I almost forgot...ummmm "sweltering Vancouver summer heat"??? Yeah...right. I grew up in Portland, so I'm not falling for that one. |
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keeblem Inner circle Essex, UK 1167 Posts |
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On 2012-01-26 11:03, Al Angello wrote: Al, you are a rude and arrogant man. After reading the above it shows that YOU are the rank amateur. Completely disrespectful to other people's opinions and so far up your own a**e you cannot see anything else except you own narrow minded thoughts. Mark |
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Peter Cuddihy Veteran user Peter S. Cuddihy 369 Posts |
Tony Chris,
Most impressive indeed! Peter Cuddihy |
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