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Posted by: truerserenity (Jul 11, 2011 4:38am) |
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Hi
Just a thought for those here, but do you realise that it's possible to earn a full time income from volunteering to do free shows for old peoples homes and such like?
Whilst I am currently not working professionally many years back in the early 90's I tried out an experiment which worked which I'd like to share with you all.
Basically I looked through local phone directories and found all of the Old Folks homes within a reasonable radius of my home and there were lots of them.
I contacted each of these homes and offered them 90 minutes of free magical entertainment, namely 30 minutes in a cabaret format where I'd do a stand up style performance for all the residents and then for the next hour I'd socialise with the residents in their lounge area and do close up for people.
I explained that as at the time I didn't drive I'd need a taxi to and from their home and as the odd bits and bobs had to be purchased to do the tricks that whilst I usuallt charged £150 or more for such work that I'd do it 100% free if they could cover the expenses.
Now the first time I asked this much to my suprise they replied that they could indeed cover expenses from their social & recreational fund but that the maximum they paid for any single event was £30.
Now the truth is at the time I'd got a weekly bus ticket that cost at the time around £10 for unlimited travel for the week and would be using that so I stood to make £20 profit on first show alone.
Now armed with the knowledge that these places are used to paying expenses for such things I continued to contact the other homes and to cut a long story short managed to get the vast majority to book me and happily pay anywhere from £20 up to £35 for expenses.
I managed to, allowing for bus travel time as I planned my route well from one home to the next and scheduled things carefully to get to 3 different homes in a day...
This on average was giving me an income of £75 a day (sometimes more sometimes less) and I was able to do this five days a week - £75 by 5 = £375 and remember this was all paid in cash and we are going back to early 90's.
This amount of £375 on average a week may not sound a lot but compared to many normal jobs was actually above national average weekly earnings and as explained was and I would wager still is easy to achieve.
I say still is as now my own Grandmother is in such a home and I know they are still on occasion bringing in entertainers and I am aware that they still happily pay around the £25 to £35 mark for expenses.
Oh and I almost forgot to mention that although the home paid you these expenses to show up, I was often encouraged to accept tips from the residents.
Now at first I felt bad about doing this until it was explained to me that they would be offended and upset if I did not accept such tips, which whilst usually only a £1 here or 50p there, usually by end of a day with 3 homes being done in a day could easily produce another £40 or more in tips, which over the course of five days is another £200 cash income.
so if you're looking for a way to practice new material, gain some working experience and using the aforementioned approach make in excess of £500 profit a week then perhaps this is a solution for you to finally be able to say goodbye to that "normal" job.
Obviously these days its easier to find the venues thanks to the internet,
William
PS: I've introduced myself properly in the correct section of this site so feel free to check out the introductions section of Café.
Posted: Jul 11, 2011 4:46am
I forgot to mention that assuming you actually entertain the people and they have a good time then its quite easy to get rebooked every few weeks (4 to 8 - although I found 6 to be an average) at the same homes on a repeat basis.
If you've got a car (as eventually I did) and are prepeared to plan your route and travel up to 25 miles raius of your home then certainly if you live near Manchester as I do in UK then finding 90 different Old Folks homes between all the local towns and villages to book you should not be that difficult, and that's all you need to be solidly booked as per my example for 6 weeks by which time you can be looking at going back to them all in order again.
I personally don't do this anymore as am too busy with home life and other things but I have a friend who is a male vocalist (singer) and he still uses this exact business plan and is still regularly doing 3 (sometimes 4) homes each day of the week, and in his case as hes a workaholic he also does some at weekends as well.
William
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