4 Surprising Reasons You Should Book Your School Assembly Performers Directly
Maybe this story sounds familiar. You or someone on your committee decided to book a school assembly for your students. You found an agency online that promises all the wonders of quality performers. But when the day of the performance came, things didn’t work out as well as you hoped. Your best choice for future assemblies is to always go directly to the source.
I’m Graham Rogers, Arizona’s premier school assembly performer. After performing school assemblies for decades in the United States and other countries, I’ve got plenty of experience working with agencies. In this article, I’ll share with you some experiences schools and even performers have had with agents. Plus I’ll reveal four reasons why booking your assembly performer direct is the safest thing you can do!
Book Your Assembly Performer Directly Reason #1: You Know What You’re Getting
There are agencies selling shows that don’t guarantee you’ll get the performer or even the show you booked! If you’ve ever searched for assembly performers on these agency sites, you’ve likely seen dozens of different performers.
But look closely at some of the performers. You may see a notation that says something along the lines of, “Performer, backdrops, and show content may differ from what is pictured or described.” This is a sneaky way of the agency telling you that the school assembly performer you book might not be the same one pictured.
Some of this is due to location. Not all assembly performers travel nationwide. To better serve more of the country, some performers license out their show content to other presenters. This way, you can still get the same great show no matter where you are in the country…theoretically. The problem? The folks licensing the shows often make changes to it. The result? You may wind up with a very different presenter than you were expecting.
Book Your Assembly Performer Directly Reason #2: You’ll Save a LOT of Money
An agency is in business to make money. So are most assembly presenters. When you combine the two, prices are naturally going up. Some agencies find out what their assembly performers charge and simply add their fee on top. Others charge the client a lower fee and ask the performer to lower their fee.
Either way, 100% of the times I have been booked through an agent, the client always pays a LOT more for my performance. Every other assembly performer I’ve spoken to says the same thing. Whenever possible, I recommend the school book their performer directly. They’ll simply save more money that way.
Book Your Assembly Performer Directly Reason #3: You’ll Clear Up Misunderstandings
One of the problems with agencies is the folks on the phone are simply order-takers. They’re not the ones who are going to show up and perform for you. Sometimes everything works out fine. Other times…not so much.
A fellow presenter I know was once booked for a dozen or so childcare center shows over a week. The performer was told his schedule and was told he would be performing one show at each location.
But when he arrived at each center, the directors were all expecting two shows. The poor performer kept getting yelled at by these directors all week. Apparently, the directors were accustomed to having two shows at each center. But when the schedule was created for this performer, no one bothered telling the directors at each center what the plan was.
If the performer had booked the shows directly, the misunderstanding would likely have never happened.
Book Your Assembly Performer Directly Reason #4: Asking for Special Requests is Easier
Every school is different. Every district is different. What a school in New York teaches for Social-Emotional Development may be vastly different from what an Arizona school teaches. When you book your assembly performer directly, you can communicate any special requests.
If there are specific terms or concepts you’d like your performer to mention or touch on during the show, you can easily do that when you’re talking to the performer. Remember, the person on the phone for an agency likely has no idea what you’re talking about. And when the booking is passed on to the performer, the order taker on the phone may forget to tell the performer.
But that’s not all. If your school has an unusual parking situation or performing space, the presenter needs to know these details before the show. But with an agency, these details can and do slip through the cracks all the time.
Give Yourself Peace of Mind by Booking Your School Assembly Performers Directly
The above are just some of the reasons why booking your assembly performer directly makes so much sense. Besides saving oodles of money, you’re also guaranteeing yourself a smoother experience when the big day of your assembly arrives.
Ready to bring an assembly experience your students and faculty will rave about to your school? My assembly programs of STEM/science, reading, SEL, and more will create memories everyone at your school will remember for years. Contact me today for more information.