Providing Acts for Charity Events – How to work with an Entertainment Agency
I was delighted to get an email yesterday from a client, telling me that the charity event that our entertainers had performed at had raised some £30,000. This was a charity race day event held at Lingfield Park in aid of St Catherine’s Hospice, and two of our entertainers had generously given up their time for free.
We naturally get asked a lot about providing artists for charitable events, and actually it is very rare that we supply artists completely free of charge. As an entertainment agency, it is a delicate thing asking performers to work for nothing, especially in instances where the artists could assume that we, as the entertainment agency, are getting good press and PR, when they are not even getting their bus fare. However what we very regularly do is offer exceptionally good rates to charitable organisations, taking a very low (or even no) commission and negotiating excellent fees with artists.
I have been asked by a few charities about the best way of going about obtaining good rates from entertainment agencies, so I thought I would share some thoughts on that here.
1. Set a budget Even a very low budget can help to secure good quality artists for your charity event, and it makes us as an entertainment agent able to make a valid approach to performers to try to get them interested.
2. Be precise about requirements If we are working for low or no commission, we really need to know what you need – we don’t want to be going all around the houses to find balloon modellers, if actually you end up needing a magician! By all means call us for advice, but before we start looking try to decide what will work best for your event and guests.
3. Sell the charity to us Our artists are much more likely to work for low fees if they know a little about what your charity does. It may well strike a personal chord with them, making it all the more likely that they will want to help you out.
4. Come Back to Us Again If we have helped you out once, we love it if you ask us to help you out again. It shows a loyalty and thanks on your behalf, and a value in what we have offered you. Don’t be shy about asking twice, or even thrice!
So why did we agree to supply acts to the St Catherine’s Hospice event for free? Well, a combination of factors. The artists both wanted to do it, and we have a close and personal connection with the event organiser. She has helped to recommend us in the past, so we feel positively about the possibility of our artists getting future work via her connections, if not specifically from this event. Plus, the hospice is local to our office base – the local connection certainly helped.
This really isn’t something we would do very often, however charities looking for acts for their events at a low cost are welcome to contact us. You can view the range of acts we can offer on our website, www.h2ohentertainment.com, or contact us at [email protected], or at the office on 01273 626650.
I’ll close this blog by extending a personal thanks to Bec and Equador – who played no small part in the raising of that £30,000 for the hospice, and who have surely gained some good karma to last them some time. Thanks both!
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