When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Lisa Lane-Collins

Lisa Lane-Collins

Sophomore
Dec 9, 2012
270
0
16
Adelaide, Australia
Tentatively posting this in varsity because both myself and the other tech have tech as our only sources of income.

Last night I saw someone advertising for a lighting tech for a show tonight. Recommended my lighting tech friend, but as I'm flat broke and know my way around a desk, also offered myself in the event he was busy. Turns out he was/is. Person doing the booking asked me my price, I named a relatively low one, I'm not a lighting tech really, didn't seem right to charge pro rates and got the gig.

Turns out the show is at a venue that has, not a lighting tech come standard as such, but when people want lights, he's the person that gets booked. He's excellent at it and priced accordingly. He's not Always there though so thought nothing of the fact that they wanted to bring in their own. Turns out he had been booked right up until this morning and since I came along being all cheaper, he's out of a gig and understandably not happy about it.

I need advise on the best course of action..

Honestly I'm struggling in this industry and it's not for a lack of skill or passion. Since I can't get any kind of decent regular work, I need the money and it sucks having two people who, from where I'm standing appear to be in much better financial positions getting angry at me for taking this one slice of pie.

On the flip side, it's a small city, we all have to work together, the lighting tech has always been helpful to me in the past. I could deny my services for the Sunday show and force the booker's hand (either he rebooks the professional lighting tech, or he goes without). That way I could regain honour. (But I can't eat honour, or use it to pay rent). I feel like if I had been taken under the wing of a more established tech here they could give me accurate advice on how to navigate the politics of audio. But from a purely business standpoint, ceding the Sunday job would be madness. Help?
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

I would let the other tech know the situation and work the gig, but then increase your price to a more standard rate. If price is a bigger deal than quality it says more about the tech than the rate.

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Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Lisa Lane-Collins said:
I named a relatively low one, I'm not a lighting tech really, didn't seem right to charge pro rates and got the gig.
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Why don't you think it would be right to charge the going rates of a lighting tech? You are going to be there and put in your all on the job just like anyone else. The value to the client is going to be similar no matter what. When you charge lower rates, you aren't going to stop being broke. I know it's tough when cashflow isn't there, but keep your rates up and the jobs you DO get will be worth more to you. Try it, you might be surprised.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Brian jojade said:
Why don't you think it would be right to charge the going rates of a lighting tech? You are going to be there and put in your all on the job just like anyone else. The value to the client is going to be similar no matter what. When you charge lower rates, you aren't going to stop being broke. I know it's tough when cashflow isn't there, but keep your rates up and the jobs you DO get will be worth more to you. Try it, you might be surprised.
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This is a good topic. User two sides R&D get off the bat. The first is that the regular guy is highly skilled. 2nd is Lisa admits to not being a lighting tech. In my area, I see the overall quality of audio production going down because people who I don't consider 'skilled' work cheaper and devalue the market...but if the charges what I charged and did a crappy job...that doesn't help either. I am just an old guy who thinks the quality of the product should rule.
Opinions and tactics?
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

It depends on how off the price was. If you're going to be a lighting tech, you have to be good enough to do the job. If you're not good enough, no price is the right price. As long as you have the skill set to accomplish the job, that's what matters. If the OP isn't a lighting tech full time, but has the knowledge and ability to do a professional job, why should the rate charged be less?
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Which brings us to what rate we should charge - the one we think we deserve based on skill level or the one the customer is willing to pay for good work?
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Max Warasila said:
Which brings us to what rate we should charge - the one we think we deserve based on skill level or the one the customer is willing to pay for good work?
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It depends if the customer is rational or not. It's quite often that some customers want steak at a hamburger budget. Should they get steak because that's all they are willing to spend?

There should be an absolute minimum charge for certain services that allow for reasonable profit. Yes, there are different grades of steak, and the higher end cuts are still steak, but cost quite a bit more. Still, it's much higher than hamburger all around.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

I saw posted a pretty good solution to the pricing part: charge what it would cost you to cover the gig if you couldn't be there. I think that price would be higher than what the OP bid for the job.


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Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Bob Charest said:
I saw posted a pretty good solution to the pricing part: charge what it would cost you to cover the gig if you couldn't be there. I think that price would be higher than what the OP bid for the job.
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Adding to that, charge what it would cost to cover the gig with someone that won't tarnish your reputation in doing so. Sometimes you could find someone to 'cover' a gig at an insanely low price, but then they don't provide service up to par of what you can provide.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

But that doesn't really set a valued price just a price that someone else came up with based likely on someone else all it does is shift the original problem. How I estimate my freelance is, how much work (ie. Am I working with 120k par rig and dimmers or is it multi unit show with 10 universes and multiple sticks?) Then comes demand are they asking me because everyone else said no or am I the first choice. I'll give a discount to first choice but I may hold onto the bone for a last minute call.

In the end you are a product. If you can't determine your products worth look at your competitors

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Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

If a client is only willing to pay bottom dollar, we are doing the industry a disservice in helping the race to the bottom for giving more equipment than fair. If the only difference between us and the next company is price - we have lost.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Lisa Lane-Collins said:
Tentatively posting this in varsity because both myself and the other tech have tech as our only sources of income.

Last night I saw someone advertising for a lighting tech for a show tonight. Recommended my lighting tech friend, but as I'm flat broke and know my way around a desk, also offered myself in the event he was busy. Turns out he was/is. Person doing the booking asked me my price, I named a relatively low one, I'm not a lighting tech really, didn't seem right to charge pro rates and got the gig.

Turns out the show is at a venue that has, not a lighting tech come standard as such, but when people want lights, he's the person that gets booked. He's excellent at it and priced accordingly. He's not Always there though so thought nothing of the fact that they wanted to bring in their own. Turns out he had been booked right up until this morning and since I came along being all cheaper, he's out of a gig and understandably not happy about it.

I need advise on the best course of action..

Honestly I'm struggling in this industry and it's not for a lack of skill or passion. Since I can't get any kind of decent regular work, I need the money and it sucks having two people who, from where I'm standing appear to be in much better financial positions getting angry at me for taking this one slice of pie.

On the flip side, it's a small city, we all have to work together, the lighting tech has always been helpful to me in the past. I could deny my services for the Sunday show and force the booker's hand (either he rebooks the professional lighting tech, or he goes without). That way I could regain honour. (But I can't eat honour, or use it to pay rent). I feel like if I had been taken under the wing of a more established tech here they could give me accurate advice on how to navigate the politics of audio. But from a purely business standpoint, ceding the Sunday job would be madness. Help?
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You could always do the job, then be honest with the promoter next time he asks. You can always say "Yeah, I did it for that cheap last time because I did not have any gigs, but now I need to charge more" Most people will understand that. Also, years ago I found that one of the best ways to get regular work is to get a job at some corporate event center/convention center and do both what you are doing as far as live sound and also do some corporate stuff as a tech.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

There shouldn't be anything wrong with charging what you are worth in a free market. If you believe in a free market, that is. If you believe that the market should be controlled by unions, or if you indeed live somewhere where unions rule, then there should be a standard rate and all that goes with that, including either being let into the "society" or find something else to do.
In this industry, where the price of a performer can vary by a factor of 100, why shouldn't there be room for some variance when it comes to the valuation and thus the price of the skill on the tech support end?
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Tim Duffin said:
You could always do the job, then be honest with the promoter next time he asks. You can always say "Yeah, I did it for that cheap last time because I did not have any gigs, but now I need to charge more" Most people will understand that. Also, years ago I found that one of the best ways to get regular work is to get a job at some corporate event center/convention center and do both what you are doing as far as live sound and also do some corporate stuff as a tech.
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Better yet, say you did it as a favor for someone you know and respect, but it's not your normal rate.
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Been quietly lurking all week reading peoples input :)

Worked the second lighting show last night, with the displaced lighting tech working as well, in the capacity of sound tech (absurd, ludicrous, ironic, we should swap!!!). End of the night I asked him to make an assessment of my lighting show and he reckoned it wasn't high energy enough (did not have a nice word to say actually but I should have expected as much). So, there, Right there, that's the reason I'm $100 cheaper than he is and he can see it for himself. Before he shot me down I was feeling pretty good about it and thinking I Could up my price but maybe way more practice required.... hiphop lights are hard, much harder than 80s new wave.

The question of what is the bare minimum just for a beginner body to be there pushing faders is a good one. If you do context sensitive pricing (and I do) this venue does everything from small community events right up to international touring acts (500 capacity). The house techs regard it as a high calibre international touring band venue needing a high level of production but I've mixed all manner of small and unprofitable things in there over the years. So when this booker told me it was at this venue, the thought did not cross my mind that it was going to be a "big deal" act needing a high level of production (obviously, not His either). It's totally plausible that a medium level interstate act from the 80s might not have the budget for a top shelf, A grade lighting tech (that was Tuesday show) and the international hip hop guy last night, before I was booked, they didn't even Have a lighting tech. So I might not have done high energy flashy flashy lighting show, but I'm confident I was a step up from static lights! I might have quoted what seems like a low price to the pros, but for a commercially unviable gig, on a Tuesday night, for 4 hours work, doing something that's not my forte, seemed like a good price to me.

I think ruffled feathers have been smoothed back down, although I got the strong impression they'd rather I just backed off and didn't add another skill to my repertoire of things I can do to earn income, or work in that venue for a lower price offering a more basic product. Ideologically speaking I could not disagree with them more.

On the dodgy booker, I don't think he Wanted steak, that's the only reason I put my hand up. (awesome analogy by the way).

The across the board drop in standards when the value for a skill drops, that's live sound mixing in the local live music scene in a nut shell here. So I can very much relate to this. But then I can also see there's no money in that scene, and I got good advice, here in fact, to find better clients, ones with money, ones who value quality. Personally, I figure you leave the stingy clients to their fates, not have words with them which is what the house techs at this venue are planning to do. All more small industry politics I think.

Also the strategy for pricing where you can cover the cost of an appropriately good substitute is super good. I'm pretty sure if I put my prices up (sound teching) in the local scene I'll just lose work so I'm not sure if that charging more thing never costing you money will stand true in this small scene, but quoting higher and looking for more clients until you find some that can pay is something I am already doing wearing my sound tech hat.

Thank you all for your thoughts, was feeling pretty panicked Tuesday so good to hear outside perspective (outside of the little clique of established techs that work at this venue).
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

To be honest don't take his words without some salt. His business depends on you not being in it. I know techs who will discredit their competitors in a heartbeat in hopes of taking the gig. It takes practice and not to mention if the acts aren't bringing in their own LD they really have no room for complaints. That said how did the audience react. Remember yes we are paid by the promoter/venue but they are payed by the fans. If they were happy the. You did your job as a "professional" LD

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Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Audience members were fanatic, if the in between song banter is to be believed, the loudest and most enthusiastic audience all tour :-D All crowded up to the stage barrier and knowing the second to last song in it's entirety (legit, headliner did not sing a word, audience sang it all from start to finish).

Ahh, all of the grains of salt. But he's shooting himself in the foot, because if he doesn't succeed in discouraging me entirely, then I continue to offer my fledgling skills at a lower rate (maybe not as low as this time, but I'd be a fraud if I charged as much as him without the experience to back it up). Hubris?!!
 
Re: When you take a job and find out you undercut someone.

Lisa Lane-Collins said:
Been quietly lurking all week reading peoples input :)

On the dodgy booker, I don't think he Wanted steak, that's the only reason I put my hand up.
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That's the thing though, there are lots of people in the industry insisting that the customer should always pay for a renowned Michelin four star chef even when the customer only wants a burger flipper at Macdonald rates :twisted:

Keep it up, you are as entitled to try to make a living as the guy charging twice your rate
 
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