Karaoke Forums

As you know, there are always going to be one or two people who love to complain... the music is too loud... turn the lights off, they bother me... etc. While you're never going to please everyone, would you even try?

For example, if 99% of your singers are loving what you do and having a great time, would you change anything or stop doing something because of a whiner or complainer even if it means he or she leaving? My opinion is leave. Why should the others who are having a good time have to suffer because of you. That's my opinion, what's yours?

_________________
Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

I totally agree with you Alan, but yet this site let the complainers run everyone off, meaning majority that was here were having fun with how things were!! Yet complainers came in & took over effectively killing the singers showcase!! Sure we still have a few die hards here who have been around a while, but it will never be like it once was when most people left other sites to come to this one!!

So I'm with you Alan!!! Don't let complainers & trouble makers ruin your business!!! Don't even try to please them, let them be the ones to leave and never come back!! Keep your business Alive!!!! 100%

[quote="Alan B"]As you know, there are always going to be one or two people who love to complain... the music is too loud... turn the lights off, they bother me... etc. While you're never going to please everyone, would you even try?

For example, if 99% of your singers are loving what you do and having a great time, would you change anything or stop doing something because of a whiner or complainer even if it means he or she leaving? My opinion is leave. Why should the others who are having a good time have to suffer because of you. That's my opinion, what's yours?[/quote]
Be careful Alan, you may just end up with zero singers. Just about everyone is going to have something that they may not like about how you run your show in one way or another.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Danny I would bet that Alan is way beyond knowing how to keep his singers happy. That fear goes out the door when you consider yourself a professional. That could change if a group of Russians started frequenting his show.

Collusion can be found everywhere, and in all sorts of forms. Pam Bondi, Florida AG, wants to depose me because I sang "Back To The USSR" back in Nov 2016 when President Trump was here in Sarasota doing his last pre-election speech. Now that is the kind of stuff to be worried about!

Is there no place on this planet that Trump doesn't come up? The plan is to crowd out all the media and just have Trump as the center of the universe. He wasn't able to do that In New York City, and yet he is able to flood the news cycles now that he has gone national. I would be very happy if for just one month we wouldn't have to bring up the Donald at all. Of course that is just my take on it.

What ever happened to 'majority rules?

_________________
DJ Don

Now here is something I can completely with you on!

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Danny, you are so naive. No, you can't please everyone. And no, you don't even consider the needs of the whiners, complainers, and trouble makers. They can leave. We don't need them. As long as you're making the majority of your singers happy, nothing else matters.

You will learn or should have learned by now, that your job is to make the bar money. And you will learn or should have learned by now, just who you need to cater to in order to make that happen.

While I try to run a fair rotation, the bar doesn't care about fair. They care about who's spending money.

Case in point...

my busiest night is my Thursday venue. I get an average of 30 singers. Of these, around 10 of them come in at the start of the evening. They are an older crowd and basically don't spend much money. They're basically water and soda drinkers and rarely do they order something to eat. A cheap bunch. The waitresses don't even want to wait on them because they rarely will leave a tip.

Then, later in the evening I have a table of around 10 people who are all friends come in around 11. The bar wants me to cater to them so they don't leave. Why? Because the bar will make around 300 to 400 dollars off them as opposed to the table of the older folks which they may only make 40 or 50 dollars. The bar doesn't care if they leave. They can go drink water someplace else. No great loss.

Personally, I will work these singers in and get them all singing. We want to make them happy and keep them spending money. The other cheap table has already sang and are just taking up space. (Personally, I'd be embarrassed to go to a bar and enjoy the entertainment, and then not support the bar by ordering anything. Water does not pay the bills. Bars rely on the sales of food and drinks to cover the cost of entertainment. Without those sales, there won't be any entertainment and you won't have a job.)

As you can see, it's your job to keep people there spending money. That's what you're hired to do. It may not always be fair but the name of the game is sales.

Remember, the size of your crowd means nothing if they aren't spending money.

So, again... I try to be fair to everyone but this is a business. We can't cater to everyone.

I doubt you'll get what I'm saying... but, do what it takes to make the bar money. But I know you won't get it.

_________________
Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

I don't play any favorites based on whether or not they are drinking soda or alcohol. The only cheapskates that will get pulled from my rotation are those stupid enough to bring in outside drinks or food. If you are so disrespectful to bring in your own drinks, you don't deserve to sing.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

The venues I work at have minimum spending limits. If they drink water they would have to drink around 7 or 8 bottles at 2 dollars a bottle. The other place (a beautiful country club) has a buffet, and if you attend you have to eat or you get charged anyway.

Believe it or not both places are packed during season and 2/3 full in off season. I have worked very hard at running off the non-spenders, and the bars have backed my every move.

You see, the spenders don't like seeing non-spenders benefit equally in the entertainment. We are NOT a socialist nation. You have to pay your fair share.

See, I knew you wouldn't get it.

_________________
Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

And he didn't. Danny, it's not about if they drink water, soda or beer, it's about spending money. If they spent a boat load on soda or bottled water, that would be fine.... why.... because they spent money.

As I have said in the past, I treat my singers, the same way that I as a customer want to be treated. As long as they are spending MONEY, doesn't matter what they are spending on, they get treated equally. The only ones that I won't allow to sing are the ones who are not spending any money.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

With that attitude, if I owned a bar, you'd never be working for me.

I'll say this one more time...

You have two groups of people at your show. One group supports the bar, which helps pay your salary, by spending money on food and drinks. The other group comes in for the free entertainment and spends hardly any money (water drinkers) supporting the bar.

Do you think that this group deserves to be treated just as good as the group spending money? A group that IMO are a bunch of freeloaders who come in for the entertainment buy aren't willing to support the bar. No, Danny... they don't deserve the same treatment.

You seem to overlook the fact that it's not about you and your "fairness". It's about doing what you were hired to do and that's make the bar money. Yes, I'm going to cater to the supporters of the bar who spend the money over the freeloaders any day.

_________________
Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

Does this mean you expect your entertainment to enforce who they entertain to based on their spending? Does a band or DJ need to stop playing because someone is spending 'cheaply'? For me as long as the bar is allowing someone to remain on premises - they are equal game to the entertainment regardless of what they are spending - that is not my job to monitor.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Lon, My experience has been that if you put too much responsibility on the bar they will give up karaoke all together. Karaoke has so much to complain about as compared to a band. If I asked, or let the bar monitor the violators, then the bar would fail for sure.

Alan, reread my post. I count soda drinkers as buying drink. They can easily keep the bar from being sued by being transportation for those who are drinking alcohol. If anyone in our state goes out drinking and driving and gets into an accident and the person who gets hit dies, their family can sue the bar for serving the person responsible for their loveone's death. In our state, the bar can only charge for water if it's bottled. If they buy food and just drink water, I refuse to penalize them. I am a soda drinker myself, which is why I don't penalize soda drinkers. Now if they don't buy anything, they lose their spot in the rotation.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Danny, it's not just about whether of not someone buys a soda.

Let's say you have two tables, each with 5 singers. Everyone at table A buys a soda at $2 and buys nothing more for the rest of the night. The bar will have made a whopping $10 off 5 people.

Meanwhile the people at table B all order food and drinks. And order more drinks. The bar is going to make between 2 and 3 hundred dollars off this table.

Now, which table do you want to keep there? Which table are you going to cater too? If you don't know the answer, just ask the owner... I'm sure he or she would tell you.

In my opinion, someone who spends only $2 for the entire night should not receive the same treatment as the person who spends $50 for the night. It's a no brainer that you cater to the ones making you money. This is Business 101.

Now, I'm not saying that you shouldn't be nice to everyone. I will always be nice and respectful to all patrons. But...

You are there to make the bar money. Karaoke is just a tool in which to do it. Fairness does not pay the bars bills, the people spending the money, does.

I'll leave you with this...

If the bar wanted to give away a free dinner and asked you to pick someone, would you show your appreciation to someone who's always supporting the bar by ordering food and drinks? Or would you give it to one of the cheapskate soda drinkers?

_________________
Electro-Voice Evolve 50... Taking Sound To The Next Level.

I see your point if table A, everyone just buys one soda the whole time. I have never been in a bar that charged once for a soda and then provided free refills, even at a restaurant that has a bar connected to it, unless they also bought dinner. But those places also charged per soda after they paid the bill.

_________________
The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Thank God for a voice of reason! I was shocked by some of the things that I read in this thread. Anytime I hear someone use the word "fair", I keep one hand on my wallet and the other on the silverware. I mean really, how can someone criticize a person for treating all singers fairly, then out of the other side of their mouth state that treating "soda drinkers" the same as higher spending clientele as being "unfair" to the higher spending group? Which is it? Perhaps the local grocer should have those who spend less than $100 bag their own groceries? Maybe all businesses should treat people differently based on the amount of money they spend and not on the basis of their humanity? What a crappy attitude! What you really mean here is that it doesn't conform to YOUR idea of fair and not some sort of free market or fairness doctrine. I sure hope this isn't the prevailing attitude amongst most KJs. Aside from being bourgeoisie and archaic, from a business perspective it's downright stupid. This is a perfect example of the Peter principle, where the manager/business owner has reached his/her level of incompetence. You won't see these folks being the next CEO of General Motors anytime soon.

For those of you who think that their role is "make the bar money", you've grossly overestimated the importance of your role. Your role IS NOT to make the bar money any more so than the bartender, the cook, or the wait staff. There are far too many variables of which you have absolutely no control over such as advertising, menu choices, pricing, seating arrangements, decor, wait staff, etc., etc., etc. Your role is to PROVIDE ENTERTAINMENT to the establishment's clientele. It's the establishment's role and responsibility to oversee the type of entertainment, cover charges, spending minimums, and to employ whatever other revenue generating instruments are to their avail, etc. If you're good at what you do, the rest will take care of itself. Leave the financial decisions in the hands of those who have the most control over them and have a vested interest in them. If they're incapable of making those decisions, then their failure is imminent anyway and it's only a matter of time before they fold. A final thought about a comment that really struck me as ironically funny was where someone stated that we are not a socialist nation, yet in the very next sentence blurted the collectivist notion of having to "pay your fair share". Yikes!