Children's parties

[lyndylou]

Hi
I am an ex redcoat looking to start my own business as a children's party entertainer ( no not bobo the "mad" clown ) I run fun & games sessions Dance drama or singing activities - play parachute games or face painting I can organise themed parties and can even bring along live creepy Crawlies for "nice" little boys parties. - What I need help with is pricing could anyone tell me how much they would pay ( maybe there is someone in your area doing something like this and you know how much they charge ) Should it be price per child - per hour - per event or what - Plz help I am really struggling with this bit and have no friends with children that I can ask - I need to start earning asap

Thanks in anticipation - and if anyone in the north west would like a party - let me know and we can arrange something through e-mail

[lozzylou]

hi when we booked my sons party at a big play centre soft play thing it was priced at 7 pound per child. they didnt get alot for this tbh.
maybe you could have a set price for the party and say up to 15 kids. then charge extra for any other child

or you could have a set price for a simple party and then charge extra for the extra activities.

have a look about at any party centres in your area and see what they are charging.

[lyndylou]

thanks for that - did you feel this was good value - since you said they didn't get a lot for their �7 and plz what is tbh
also did you as the mum pay for everyone !!
good advice tho lozzylou thanks

[lil75]

TBH...to be honest!

[lozzylou]

hi, yes i paid for all the children. somtimes it is better for the parent if you pay per child, but not always for you. we had to pay a 40 pound deposit and the rest on the day. we booked for 14 kids but only 12 turned up, so we only had to pay for 12.
when i said they didnt get much i mean, for the price we paid it was ok, but the staff didnt really do anything with the children they were left to entertain themselves. so if you are thinkin of doing activities with them and playing with them then i would charge more.
i would think maybe 8-10 pound per child, to include party food, singing and games, and maybe face painting and if they want a themed party them rise the price to maybe an extra 2-3 pound per child.

[redcrx]

A friend of mine paid �85 for an hour for a party Fairy for her daughters birthday.

The fairy played music on her stereo, handed out some plastic wands to the little girls, which she took back when she left (try explaining that to young children). I saw 2 games of pass the parcel which had a gift in each layer (the sort of thing you get in a cracker) and 2 games of sleeping lions.

I have to say that i wouldnt pay for anything like that after seeing what she got for �85.

[echokilo]

Might be easier to work out how much you need to earn and then divide this by the number of parties you realistically expect to book each week ... the reason I say this is that a friend recently explored doing just as you plan but the figures simply didn't work out, so she ditched the idea and now does party catering and supplies party bags etc instead - that way you can fit in more per week, and so earn more.

[annie0000]

You need to decide on what a suitable number of children is for each of the parties that you are doing. i.e. if you are doing face painting, they are likely to be smaller children and if it takes 10 minutes per child, you wouldn't want to be doing many as they wouldn't get to do anything else.

Most parties last around 2 hours - you need to factor in a break where the parents or organiser would serve the party food and do the cake.

I would suggest a one hour stint and if they want you to do the half hour after the food, you charge accordingly.

I would phone round a few competitors and see what they charge and what you get. For example I know that a friend paid over 100 pound for a magician for her sons party and he did an hour - he was really good and he also handed out mini magic tricks to the kids to take away and he did them a balloon model - he had a maximum of 10 for that, although he did an alterative show for larger groups with no hand out or balloon model and I think the price was similar, but the show was slightly longer.

I would make up a list based on what you would do for what price -ensuring that if you need any materials that you cannot use again e.g. face paints, presents etc that you factor this into the cost.

I am sure that a company called enjoy a ball do group parties and they have a website that may give you an idea.
Can't remember the cost but I think that it was about 100 pound.