I'll start this post out with my caveat regarding confidentiality about people I blog about. At least six months or more will have elapsed and I'll remove any specific information that might identify them. Not that anything really bad happened, but its a little embarrassing.
It was really slow Sunday at the club. As per usual I was sitting in a corner, hoping to mitigate the DJ's audio assault on my ears. I'll spare you my usual rant about DJs that crank the music when nobody is in the club. Yes, there is nobody in the place and you are doing your best to make sure it stays that way. OK, that was a little rant.
What few people that were in the club were at the bar. On stage the dancers were more interested in either practicing pole moves or sending text messages. It was as subdued as you could get in a strip club and still be open for business. None of my favorite dancers were there, but I decided to hang out a bit to see if any would show up. After few drinks I needed to use the restroom. To get the restroom I had to walk along the bar. This can sometimes be a little hazardous, since the folks at the bar usually have their backs to you, your drink is at risk getting knocked out of your hand.
On the way back to me seat I'm walking along the bar. One dancer sitting at the bar facing away with her back to the bar, elbows on the counter looking away from me. I'm not sure is she was demonstrating her latest pole trick, had an involuntary muscle spasm, or reenacting her favorite scene from Kung Fu Panda but as I walked by her leg shot out and kick me below the belt. A direct hit. When you see a flash a light as your nerves are overloaded.
When ever I get hurt like that my first instinct is not to react. I grew up with three older brothers that were inflicting pain in one form or another, I never wanted to give them the satisfaction that they hurt me. Nothing good ever really came of this, except the ability to take a punch with out reacting. This only resulted in getting hit again. I didn't react much she kicked me. I just hesitated for a second then headed for a chair, the nearest chair. The dancer followed me, asking if I was OK. Yes, squeaked back in a falsetto voice. Your voice doesn't really go up, but taking a deep breath is really out of the question at that moment. At best you can chirp out short replies.
Despite my answer it was readily apparent I wasn't since I was inexorably and involuntarily slowly curling into the fetal position. The bartender quickly arrived with a glass of water. I appreciated the thought, but considering the section of my anatomy that had suffered a severe trauma, drinking water didn't seem like a good idea.
After a minute or so I began to recover. the dancer was really apologetic and offered to by me a drink. Again, nice thought, but not really desirable. We chatted for a little bit, trading assorted trauma stories. Then she ask me if I wanted to buy some dances. Uhm, no. Call me petty, but if you try to neuter me with a six inch clear platform heel I'm going to hold a grudge.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Dude, it's not a contest
I don’t go to strip clubs to interact with guys. Fortunately most of the guys who come into clubs don’t want to interact with me so its happy situation. The only exception is when it comes to tipping. I generally don’t comment about customers, mostly because I am a customer (something about throwing stones in glass houses) and there are far better blogs out there by dancers that cover this. That being said, I’ll talk about other customers.
It might seem peculiar but I had to learn about tipping through trail and error. It takes a nut job like me to take something simple like tipping and over thinking it. I had rather naïve idea that the amount of time a dancer would pay me was directly proportional to the amount of my tip. If I was sitting at the rack with three other guys who each had a dollar in front of them and I had three dollars in front of me the dancer should be spending half the song dancing for me. It seemed logical there was six dollars on the rack and I contributed half of it, I should get half the girls time. It’s not the simple. I larger scheme of things my three dollar tip probably represents less than one percent of the dancers take that night. I’m not sure what I was expecting, “Ooh, Todd tipped me and extra two dollars! Early retirement here I come.” Eventually I figured out that the dancer’s customer management issues where far more complex than that. Even if the other guys weren’t tipping as much during that set, they might be dances later or be their regular.
What was weird was when I ran into another customer who would turn the set into a tipping war. If I tipped three he would tip four. This was good for the dancer on stage usually. Sometimes it would cause problems. Puppet master type customers need to occupy every second of her time and gets upset if anybody else takes her attention away can get ugly. For me this has never gone beyond dirty looks, but some dancers have had pretty bad evenings dealing with a temperamental child masquerading as an adult at a strip club. Somehow they think it’s a contest or I’m stealing from them. I’ve had one guy intentionally sit between me and the stage. When I moved he’d move, always staying between me and the stage. I fully expect to see his mug shots on the 5 o’clock news some day.
Another type of customer I really hate is the rail thief. This is the guy that waits for me to put a tip at the rail then proceeds to sit down behind it as if he put it up. I really don’t care if he sits between me and the stage, if it was that important I’d sit at the stage. But don’t sit at the stage like there’s time left on parking meter. It’s stealing from the dancer and disrespectful of the other customers that actually do tip.
Squatters are more of a nuisance to me, but a major point of irritation for the dancers. These are the “customers” that buy a drink and spend the entire evening sitting at the tables never tipping a thing. At least throw a buck up there on occasion. I admit I don’t always tip, but I try. Some times these guys can a bit creepy for customers. They are kind of the opposite of the puppet master, on the rare occasion I’m at the rack they’ll intentionally sit behind me or somebody else who is tipping. I assume its to get a closer look at the dancer, who is most likely ignoring these guys. Its definitely uncomfortable to have somebody constantly making a point to sit behind you.
I’m sure there are a few customers out who think I’m an idiot. I’m not too worried about upsetting folks. I’ve managed to crush my traffic with my summertime melt down. When I had this blog on myspace I averaged about 300 hits a week. My current rate is about 2 percent of that number. Oh well, at least I don’t get any more messages asking me how to get a dancer to go out with you. (You can’t. Give up now and save yourself some grief. Just enjoy the visit.)
It might seem peculiar but I had to learn about tipping through trail and error. It takes a nut job like me to take something simple like tipping and over thinking it. I had rather naïve idea that the amount of time a dancer would pay me was directly proportional to the amount of my tip. If I was sitting at the rack with three other guys who each had a dollar in front of them and I had three dollars in front of me the dancer should be spending half the song dancing for me. It seemed logical there was six dollars on the rack and I contributed half of it, I should get half the girls time. It’s not the simple. I larger scheme of things my three dollar tip probably represents less than one percent of the dancers take that night. I’m not sure what I was expecting, “Ooh, Todd tipped me and extra two dollars! Early retirement here I come.” Eventually I figured out that the dancer’s customer management issues where far more complex than that. Even if the other guys weren’t tipping as much during that set, they might be dances later or be their regular.
What was weird was when I ran into another customer who would turn the set into a tipping war. If I tipped three he would tip four. This was good for the dancer on stage usually. Sometimes it would cause problems. Puppet master type customers need to occupy every second of her time and gets upset if anybody else takes her attention away can get ugly. For me this has never gone beyond dirty looks, but some dancers have had pretty bad evenings dealing with a temperamental child masquerading as an adult at a strip club. Somehow they think it’s a contest or I’m stealing from them. I’ve had one guy intentionally sit between me and the stage. When I moved he’d move, always staying between me and the stage. I fully expect to see his mug shots on the 5 o’clock news some day.
Another type of customer I really hate is the rail thief. This is the guy that waits for me to put a tip at the rail then proceeds to sit down behind it as if he put it up. I really don’t care if he sits between me and the stage, if it was that important I’d sit at the stage. But don’t sit at the stage like there’s time left on parking meter. It’s stealing from the dancer and disrespectful of the other customers that actually do tip.
Squatters are more of a nuisance to me, but a major point of irritation for the dancers. These are the “customers” that buy a drink and spend the entire evening sitting at the tables never tipping a thing. At least throw a buck up there on occasion. I admit I don’t always tip, but I try. Some times these guys can a bit creepy for customers. They are kind of the opposite of the puppet master, on the rare occasion I’m at the rack they’ll intentionally sit behind me or somebody else who is tipping. I assume its to get a closer look at the dancer, who is most likely ignoring these guys. Its definitely uncomfortable to have somebody constantly making a point to sit behind you.
I’m sure there are a few customers out who think I’m an idiot. I’m not too worried about upsetting folks. I’ve managed to crush my traffic with my summertime melt down. When I had this blog on myspace I averaged about 300 hits a week. My current rate is about 2 percent of that number. Oh well, at least I don’t get any more messages asking me how to get a dancer to go out with you. (You can’t. Give up now and save yourself some grief. Just enjoy the visit.)
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
More ways to know you are spending too much time at a strip club
I’ve been having a tough time writing recently. Lots of ideas, just can’t seem to put them in writing. I’ll get better. In the mean time I’ll revisit a previous post with more one liners.
More ways to know you are spending too much time at a strip club:
1) Dancers ask you for a ride to work because “you’re going there anyway”
2) Dancers coming on shift tell you that your car lights are on.
3) You utter the phrase “I remember when at this club…”
4) In conversation you keep asking “Which Asia?” because you know three of them.
5) The bouncer ask you what TV channel you want to watch.
6) The waitress and bartender argue because they both know what whiskey you drink. (The waitress was right)
7) You know what dancers are working by what cars are parked in the lot.
8) When you’ve seen the same outfit on three different dancers.
9) All the people you follow on twitter have avatars that are NSFW.
This is a collection of some of the worst dancer opening lines I have heard:
1) “Will you buy me a couple drinks, I’m not drunk enough to talk to you yet”
2) “Can I sit next to you for a second, I’m trying to hide from my parole officer
3) Angry dancer stomps on my foot and calls me a fuckin’ dick, second dancer yells at her “not him, the other table”.
4) Dancer walks up tries to shake my hand, knocks drink in my lap. Turns and leaves.
5) “Men are fucking pigs…. Except you of course”
6) “You hate me don’t you”
7) “Don’t I know your brother?”
8) “I’m not leaving until you buy dances from me”
More ways to know you are spending too much time at a strip club:
1) Dancers ask you for a ride to work because “you’re going there anyway”
2) Dancers coming on shift tell you that your car lights are on.
3) You utter the phrase “I remember when at this club…”
4) In conversation you keep asking “Which Asia?” because you know three of them.
5) The bouncer ask you what TV channel you want to watch.
6) The waitress and bartender argue because they both know what whiskey you drink. (The waitress was right)
7) You know what dancers are working by what cars are parked in the lot.
8) When you’ve seen the same outfit on three different dancers.
9) All the people you follow on twitter have avatars that are NSFW.
This is a collection of some of the worst dancer opening lines I have heard:
1) “Will you buy me a couple drinks, I’m not drunk enough to talk to you yet”
2) “Can I sit next to you for a second, I’m trying to hide from my parole officer
3) Angry dancer stomps on my foot and calls me a fuckin’ dick, second dancer yells at her “not him, the other table”.
4) Dancer walks up tries to shake my hand, knocks drink in my lap. Turns and leaves.
5) “Men are fucking pigs…. Except you of course”
6) “You hate me don’t you”
7) “Don’t I know your brother?”
8) “I’m not leaving until you buy dances from me”
Sunday, February 7, 2010
How long can you look at a naked lady until she is no longer naked?
How long can long at a naked lady until she’s no longer naked? This was a question asked of me by a dancer. I suppose what she was really asking me is why do I keep coming back. Short of cosmetic surgery the dancer really isn’t going to change much. Fortunately I’m not that complicated. I can look at the same dancer every week and not get tired.
I don’t sit at the rail. There are several reasons why. Mostly it because I prefer to look at the whole dancer, not just zoom in on specific body part. I also wear bifocals sometimes I have to fight the urge to tilt my head back look through the reading section of my glasses. I suppose it would be a little rude to ask a dancer move back from the rail. Maybe I can hand her a menu ask her to step back so I can read it better. I also don’t want to trim the hair my nose which becomes an issue when you spend a lot of time with your head tilted back.
Hanging out a table next to the stage leads to some slightly peculiar tipping habits. I spend a lot of time scurrying back and forth tipping the dancer. I always try to tip while the dancer is on the other side of the stage. Despite a decade of hanging out at a strip clubs, I still sometimes feel embarrassed handing a dancer money. It’s easier to wait, I also always wait until a dancer either picks up her tips after a song, or starts the next song and leaves the tip on the rack. If I put the tip before she collects from the previous song both tips will get picked up and there won’t be any money up. This makes me fell guilty. I’m sure the dancer can figure out that the tip was for the next song, but still.
I’ve never been a big fan of hanging out at the rail, but when a favorite dancer on stage with a empty rack I’ll go up. Customers tend to act like lemmings, they crowd around the edges of the tables waiting for somebody to jump. I’m more than happy to be the alpha perv and lead the charge to the stage. But since I don’t spend much time at the rack I will occasionally get odd response from the dancer. I have many dancers tell me they suddenly feel weird with me sitting at the stage. It makes me feel like I just showed up at their house to watch them shower, putting dollar bills on the towel rack. It’s a compliment that the dancer considers me more than just a another face in the crowd.
Ultimately the one of the reasons I can look at the same dancers and not get tired is I is go to the club is for companionship. I can hang out and talk with a beautiful girl who under different conditions wouldn’t give me the time a day. Many folks rail against strip club because it dehumanizes woman. Yet it’s built on the most human of principles: the need to be around others. In no uncertain terms it has fundamental sexual quality to it. It is what you make of it. It can be art, it can be therapy, simple friendship, or monetized sexuality.
I don’t sit at the rail. There are several reasons why. Mostly it because I prefer to look at the whole dancer, not just zoom in on specific body part. I also wear bifocals sometimes I have to fight the urge to tilt my head back look through the reading section of my glasses. I suppose it would be a little rude to ask a dancer move back from the rail. Maybe I can hand her a menu ask her to step back so I can read it better. I also don’t want to trim the hair my nose which becomes an issue when you spend a lot of time with your head tilted back.
Hanging out a table next to the stage leads to some slightly peculiar tipping habits. I spend a lot of time scurrying back and forth tipping the dancer. I always try to tip while the dancer is on the other side of the stage. Despite a decade of hanging out at a strip clubs, I still sometimes feel embarrassed handing a dancer money. It’s easier to wait, I also always wait until a dancer either picks up her tips after a song, or starts the next song and leaves the tip on the rack. If I put the tip before she collects from the previous song both tips will get picked up and there won’t be any money up. This makes me fell guilty. I’m sure the dancer can figure out that the tip was for the next song, but still.
I’ve never been a big fan of hanging out at the rail, but when a favorite dancer on stage with a empty rack I’ll go up. Customers tend to act like lemmings, they crowd around the edges of the tables waiting for somebody to jump. I’m more than happy to be the alpha perv and lead the charge to the stage. But since I don’t spend much time at the rack I will occasionally get odd response from the dancer. I have many dancers tell me they suddenly feel weird with me sitting at the stage. It makes me feel like I just showed up at their house to watch them shower, putting dollar bills on the towel rack. It’s a compliment that the dancer considers me more than just a another face in the crowd.
Ultimately the one of the reasons I can look at the same dancers and not get tired is I is go to the club is for companionship. I can hang out and talk with a beautiful girl who under different conditions wouldn’t give me the time a day. Many folks rail against strip club because it dehumanizes woman. Yet it’s built on the most human of principles: the need to be around others. In no uncertain terms it has fundamental sexual quality to it. It is what you make of it. It can be art, it can be therapy, simple friendship, or monetized sexuality.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
And another thing
I’ve still been thinking about the couple previous posts, more specifically the business model the stripping industry uses. Its fundamental approach is that the dancers are client businesses of the club. The club provides a set of services that dancer can lease for a fee. The dancer can in turn use these services to generate revenue. This system works as long as the dancer can make enough money to both cover the club services and take home enough to make it work their while to show up. With the decline in the economy people aren’t spending as much. Dancers have always complained about stage fees and tip outs, but now it seems to have become much more of an issue. Dancer’s earnings have decline, but the club charges haven’t changed.
What other business models would you use for the stripping industry? I suppose one possibility would be to have the girls draw a flat salary and all tips go to club. I don’t think this wouldn’t work. If the guys know that the girl doesn’t get any money than what’s the point of tipping? Warranted or not, most guys think the drink prices are too high. If the club also gets the tip money as well, most customers are going to minimize the amount the put on stage. But it does bring up an interesting question. How much salary does a dancer have to make to make the job worth while?
I think you can come up with a number for this, but it would be an hourly rate. I really don’t think many dancers could work 40 hours a week. The physical stresses and more importantly the mental stress of having to deal with obnoxious drunk customers would wear them down.
Just guessing, I’d say most girls would need to make $50 per hour in the Portland. If a dancer did work 40 hours a week for a full year she’d make over 100K. This is $300 dollars for a six hour shift. I know a lot of girls will look at $300 and scoff; they had shifts where they made that that in less than an hour. Which is true, but they probably have had a lot more shifts where they don’t make that much money.
Another impact would be how dancers treat customers. Dancers deal with idiot customers because they have to if they want to make money. There are customers I deal with at work I would happily beat to death with a hammer if I thought I could get away with it I’m pretty dancers feel the same. There definitely would be an increased number of heel versus skull injuries at the local emergency room. I imagine most dancers wouldn’t even come out of the dressing room until they were on stage. I really can’t blame them, as much as I like to think I’m different than other customers dancers are at the club to make money.
I wonder how dancer would react to handing in all the tips to club, instead of collecting themselves. A two song, two dollar set wouldn’t be an issue but a really big set would be harder to take. Virtually every dancer I know has a picture of stack of money they made at work. That has to be an allure to dancers, walking out the door with purse full of money instead of a voided check from a direct deposit. The preferred shifts for girls would change. Friday and Saturday nights would probably be a lot less desirable if it didn’t matter how much they got tipped.
The next business model would be a commission plan. The dancer would keep a percentage of tips she makes, instead of drawing salary only. This is a lot closer to the current business model. The more the dancer gets tipped the more she makes. Most dancers will probably cringe at the thought of the club siphoning off a massive chunk of her earnings. Trying to find a balance would be hard. You could setup a declining commission rate. After a fixed point tips the percentage the club takes declines as the dancer makes more. The club makes its money at a fair rate until it recovers its cost and makes a decent profit. After that the money goes mostly to the dancers. The dancer doesn’t get gouged if she has a huge night, but the club still gets a percentage. In the current model the club only get stage fees whether the girl make 10 cents or 10 grand. If the dancer has a horrible night she doesn’t give all her money away in tip outs.
I think this model also has another benefit for the dancer. Because the clubs take is directly tied to what the dancer makes, they now have a vested interest in keeping the dancers that make money. Clubs will be much more willing to take care of dancers. A lot of clubs treat dancers like cattle. Herd them up and down the stage, just get a lot of them. The club gets paid by quantity, the more girls the more stage fees. They really don’t have much interest their welfare. If one jumps a fence and runs away, just get another one.
I often think this is a really short sighted aspect of clubs. The girls are the draw. With the dancers it’s just a really loud bar with really expensive drinks. Not all dancers are created equal. If the club has any sense they’ll take care of the dancers that bring the customers in and more importantly the customers that spend money.
What other business models would you use for the stripping industry? I suppose one possibility would be to have the girls draw a flat salary and all tips go to club. I don’t think this wouldn’t work. If the guys know that the girl doesn’t get any money than what’s the point of tipping? Warranted or not, most guys think the drink prices are too high. If the club also gets the tip money as well, most customers are going to minimize the amount the put on stage. But it does bring up an interesting question. How much salary does a dancer have to make to make the job worth while?
I think you can come up with a number for this, but it would be an hourly rate. I really don’t think many dancers could work 40 hours a week. The physical stresses and more importantly the mental stress of having to deal with obnoxious drunk customers would wear them down.
Just guessing, I’d say most girls would need to make $50 per hour in the Portland. If a dancer did work 40 hours a week for a full year she’d make over 100K. This is $300 dollars for a six hour shift. I know a lot of girls will look at $300 and scoff; they had shifts where they made that that in less than an hour. Which is true, but they probably have had a lot more shifts where they don’t make that much money.
Another impact would be how dancers treat customers. Dancers deal with idiot customers because they have to if they want to make money. There are customers I deal with at work I would happily beat to death with a hammer if I thought I could get away with it I’m pretty dancers feel the same. There definitely would be an increased number of heel versus skull injuries at the local emergency room. I imagine most dancers wouldn’t even come out of the dressing room until they were on stage. I really can’t blame them, as much as I like to think I’m different than other customers dancers are at the club to make money.
I wonder how dancer would react to handing in all the tips to club, instead of collecting themselves. A two song, two dollar set wouldn’t be an issue but a really big set would be harder to take. Virtually every dancer I know has a picture of stack of money they made at work. That has to be an allure to dancers, walking out the door with purse full of money instead of a voided check from a direct deposit. The preferred shifts for girls would change. Friday and Saturday nights would probably be a lot less desirable if it didn’t matter how much they got tipped.
The next business model would be a commission plan. The dancer would keep a percentage of tips she makes, instead of drawing salary only. This is a lot closer to the current business model. The more the dancer gets tipped the more she makes. Most dancers will probably cringe at the thought of the club siphoning off a massive chunk of her earnings. Trying to find a balance would be hard. You could setup a declining commission rate. After a fixed point tips the percentage the club takes declines as the dancer makes more. The club makes its money at a fair rate until it recovers its cost and makes a decent profit. After that the money goes mostly to the dancers. The dancer doesn’t get gouged if she has a huge night, but the club still gets a percentage. In the current model the club only get stage fees whether the girl make 10 cents or 10 grand. If the dancer has a horrible night she doesn’t give all her money away in tip outs.
I think this model also has another benefit for the dancer. Because the clubs take is directly tied to what the dancer makes, they now have a vested interest in keeping the dancers that make money. Clubs will be much more willing to take care of dancers. A lot of clubs treat dancers like cattle. Herd them up and down the stage, just get a lot of them. The club gets paid by quantity, the more girls the more stage fees. They really don’t have much interest their welfare. If one jumps a fence and runs away, just get another one.
I often think this is a really short sighted aspect of clubs. The girls are the draw. With the dancers it’s just a really loud bar with really expensive drinks. Not all dancers are created equal. If the club has any sense they’ll take care of the dancers that bring the customers in and more importantly the customers that spend money.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Reply to a Tweet
I got a tweet from a dancer regarding my last post. She pointed out an issue that I had forgotten about: tip outs. Dancers have to pay (tip out) the bouncers, the DJs and sometimes the bar staff depending on the club they work at every night. There is a minimum amount (usually $10 but it varies widely) but there is an expectation that the dance will pay more if she has a good night.
Required tip outs is a method the clubs use to defer the payroll costs from themselves to the dancers. They simply pay the club employee’s minimum wage and tell them to go get the money from the dancers. They’ll make the “real” money from tips. This is all to the clubs advantage. They minimize payroll costs and put the responsibility of getting paid on the employee. If a dancer doesn’t tip out enough she might find herself on her own with a jerk customer or find herself getting skipped for stage sets. Both of these directly affect her personal safety and her money.
If I compare this to the hair stylist model, it doesn’t have a direct comparison. The stylist doesn’t have to tip out the janitor or the cashier. Yet there are expenses a stylist has a dancer doesn’t. Most stylists are required to carry insurance or even a bond to work at a salon. So who should carry the insurance the salon or the stylists? Without the stylist the salon cannot make any money and in theory since they can bring multiple people to the policy they should get a better rate but its still money out of the salon’s pocket, not the stylist.
The major factor here is supply and demand. If there are more stylists than chairs the salons can make the rules. If a particular stylist doesn’t like paying her own insurance the salon can simply lease her chair to somebody else who is willing to carry insurance. At what point do you need to intervene with legislation? Do salons have such a grip on the industry that they can extort the insurance cost out of the stylist? I really don’t know. One thing that prevents any real change to the dancer industry is the seemly inexhaustible supply of girls who will dance.
This is not like a company store at a coal mine where it was they only employer in town. In those days you worked at the mine or you starved. If the cost is too high to be a dancer is it time to get another job? It’s a hard question, is the current tip out business model completely unfair? From a dancers point of view who is watching 30% or more of her nightly income disappear in tips its probably yes. For somebody flipping burgers at McDonalds who’s take after eight hours is still less than a dancer who works six hours it's probably no.
In my opinion instituting a minimum wage for dancers would alter the industry completely and probably not for the better. The cost to a club to pay dancers minimum wage would force a lot of clubs out of business. I was able to figure out the number of employee man hours a club would have to pay in wages. I went to the Sassy’s web site since they both post the number of dancers working a shift for a week and the length of each shift. Dancers work 502 hours a week. At the Oregon minimum wage a club would have to pay an additional $4216.80 every week. There is 52 weeks in a year so that would be a additional cost of $219,273.60 year in payroll expense. I don’t think clubs operate at that level of profit that they could absorb that much expense. If a minimum wage was implemented the major result would be a bunch of unemployed dancers. To control expenses clubs would vastly restrict the number of dancers per shift. They simply couldn’t afford to pay shifts with large number of dancers. They would become much more militant about attendance since the pool of dancers (who would basically have to be employees) would be reduced.
Using the Sassy’s schedule as a typical model there are 12 dancers working daily on weekdays and 15 dancers working on weekends. Assuming the minimum tip out of $20 per dancer that’s $1800 a week in tip outs the DJ and Bouncers get. That’s $93,000 additional payroll cost yearly for a club if they were to wave the tip out fees and pay the DJ and bouncers an equivalent amount.
The biggest difference is that the tip out cost is distributed over many dancers over a single entity (the club). Should the club have to shoulder 100% of all the operating costs if a major percentage of the revenue that walks in the front door goes to the dancers? One thing the club owner has assumed that the dancer has not is risk. If nobody comes in the owner is stuck with a bunch of liquor and furniture he can sell at a loss. While he may have a bunch of booze to drown his sorrows in he is faced with a failed business. Financially the dancer risks a nights work, if the club fails she can move on to another location. While this isn’t a trivial thing it’s not like closing down a business.
The stripping industry is built around the concept that dancers will make enough in tips to support the rest of the workers in tip out. Once the tip money falls away the compensation structure fails. From a libertarian point of view, if a girl doesn’t can't enough money dancing, she shouldn't dance. Its harsh point of view but most industries face these same questions. I used to be a design engineer, but all those jobs were getting sent off shore. About ten years ago I was faced with either becoming unemployed or switching careers. At age 40 I went into sales and marketing. That was a seriously scary point in my life.
I think what needs to be prevented is dancers getting gouged because they don’t know any better. I think a standardized pay scale for fees should be set. Another thing I think would be fair is a tip out vs number of dancers per shift adjustment. If the club allows thirty girls on a shift then the amount they tip out should be less. The club doesn’t bring in more bouncers and DJs if there are more dancers, they just collect more tip fees. This isn’t fair. If their are more girls to defer the cost of the staff, they should have to pay less. The clubs operating cost does not go up with the number of dancers. More dancers means more competition for the dollar that are available. Girls get less time on stage and have to compete with more dancers for specialty dances. I don’t know how to enforce this but this is definitely on area dancers get taken advantage of.
I think the dancers can do is to setup a system where they can compare costs, earnings, and treatment. If the top dancers start switching to clubs where they get treated better it might force a change. Dancers are simply not making as much as what they used to, the smart clubs will acknowlege this and work with the dancer to help them out. After re-reading this post all I can really conclude is this is a complex problem I don't have any good answers to.
Required tip outs is a method the clubs use to defer the payroll costs from themselves to the dancers. They simply pay the club employee’s minimum wage and tell them to go get the money from the dancers. They’ll make the “real” money from tips. This is all to the clubs advantage. They minimize payroll costs and put the responsibility of getting paid on the employee. If a dancer doesn’t tip out enough she might find herself on her own with a jerk customer or find herself getting skipped for stage sets. Both of these directly affect her personal safety and her money.
If I compare this to the hair stylist model, it doesn’t have a direct comparison. The stylist doesn’t have to tip out the janitor or the cashier. Yet there are expenses a stylist has a dancer doesn’t. Most stylists are required to carry insurance or even a bond to work at a salon. So who should carry the insurance the salon or the stylists? Without the stylist the salon cannot make any money and in theory since they can bring multiple people to the policy they should get a better rate but its still money out of the salon’s pocket, not the stylist.
The major factor here is supply and demand. If there are more stylists than chairs the salons can make the rules. If a particular stylist doesn’t like paying her own insurance the salon can simply lease her chair to somebody else who is willing to carry insurance. At what point do you need to intervene with legislation? Do salons have such a grip on the industry that they can extort the insurance cost out of the stylist? I really don’t know. One thing that prevents any real change to the dancer industry is the seemly inexhaustible supply of girls who will dance.
This is not like a company store at a coal mine where it was they only employer in town. In those days you worked at the mine or you starved. If the cost is too high to be a dancer is it time to get another job? It’s a hard question, is the current tip out business model completely unfair? From a dancers point of view who is watching 30% or more of her nightly income disappear in tips its probably yes. For somebody flipping burgers at McDonalds who’s take after eight hours is still less than a dancer who works six hours it's probably no.
In my opinion instituting a minimum wage for dancers would alter the industry completely and probably not for the better. The cost to a club to pay dancers minimum wage would force a lot of clubs out of business. I was able to figure out the number of employee man hours a club would have to pay in wages. I went to the Sassy’s web site since they both post the number of dancers working a shift for a week and the length of each shift. Dancers work 502 hours a week. At the Oregon minimum wage a club would have to pay an additional $4216.80 every week. There is 52 weeks in a year so that would be a additional cost of $219,273.60 year in payroll expense. I don’t think clubs operate at that level of profit that they could absorb that much expense. If a minimum wage was implemented the major result would be a bunch of unemployed dancers. To control expenses clubs would vastly restrict the number of dancers per shift. They simply couldn’t afford to pay shifts with large number of dancers. They would become much more militant about attendance since the pool of dancers (who would basically have to be employees) would be reduced.
Using the Sassy’s schedule as a typical model there are 12 dancers working daily on weekdays and 15 dancers working on weekends. Assuming the minimum tip out of $20 per dancer that’s $1800 a week in tip outs the DJ and Bouncers get. That’s $93,000 additional payroll cost yearly for a club if they were to wave the tip out fees and pay the DJ and bouncers an equivalent amount.
The biggest difference is that the tip out cost is distributed over many dancers over a single entity (the club). Should the club have to shoulder 100% of all the operating costs if a major percentage of the revenue that walks in the front door goes to the dancers? One thing the club owner has assumed that the dancer has not is risk. If nobody comes in the owner is stuck with a bunch of liquor and furniture he can sell at a loss. While he may have a bunch of booze to drown his sorrows in he is faced with a failed business. Financially the dancer risks a nights work, if the club fails she can move on to another location. While this isn’t a trivial thing it’s not like closing down a business.
The stripping industry is built around the concept that dancers will make enough in tips to support the rest of the workers in tip out. Once the tip money falls away the compensation structure fails. From a libertarian point of view, if a girl doesn’t can't enough money dancing, she shouldn't dance. Its harsh point of view but most industries face these same questions. I used to be a design engineer, but all those jobs were getting sent off shore. About ten years ago I was faced with either becoming unemployed or switching careers. At age 40 I went into sales and marketing. That was a seriously scary point in my life.
I think what needs to be prevented is dancers getting gouged because they don’t know any better. I think a standardized pay scale for fees should be set. Another thing I think would be fair is a tip out vs number of dancers per shift adjustment. If the club allows thirty girls on a shift then the amount they tip out should be less. The club doesn’t bring in more bouncers and DJs if there are more dancers, they just collect more tip fees. This isn’t fair. If their are more girls to defer the cost of the staff, they should have to pay less. The clubs operating cost does not go up with the number of dancers. More dancers means more competition for the dollar that are available. Girls get less time on stage and have to compete with more dancers for specialty dances. I don’t know how to enforce this but this is definitely on area dancers get taken advantage of.
I think the dancers can do is to setup a system where they can compare costs, earnings, and treatment. If the top dancers start switching to clubs where they get treated better it might force a change. Dancers are simply not making as much as what they used to, the smart clubs will acknowlege this and work with the dancer to help them out. After re-reading this post all I can really conclude is this is a complex problem I don't have any good answers to.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
So sue me
I just read an interesting article in the Willamette Week about a dancer (http://wweek.com/editorial/3602/13360/) suing a club for lost wages. I tend to be pretty sympathetic to the dancers, but this is one situation I don’t completely agree with. She’s trying to get compensated for minimum wage for days she worked.
Ultimately you get paid for doing a job because if they didn’t pay you, you wouldn’t do it. You trade your skills and labor for either money or item of equal worth. At first glance this would seem to back up the dancer’s law suit, why should she have to show up and work with no compensation. Worse yet, she has to pay to work there. The difference is the potential for making money. Dancer’s have the opportunity to make money from the job of dancing. The potential for money is great enough that it’s worth her while to pay the money. That’s the major difference between myself and a dancer. There is no realistic way I can directly sell my services and make money. I have to be associated with a larger group of people manufacturing a product. Because I can’t make money I magically have to be compensated? No, if they didn’t compensate me I wouldn’t do it. I love my job, but not enough to do it for free. Nobody would.
How is the dancer’s job different that a hair stylist? Depending on the salon the stylist has to rent a chair, provide her own tools and supplies, and does not draw a wage from the salon. She makes her money from her customer base that comes in. The salon provides a set of services and large capital equipment for rent. To some extent she has to reply on the salon to promote itself, but much like a dancer she can use social networking to promote herself as well. If the stylist doesn’t make any money should the salon pay her a minimum wage? What about real estate agent?
In many ways if she wins the case it would be landmark ruling. I don’t think she stands much of chance of getting any money, provided that club didn’t do anything shady. Unfortunately that’s a big if. If there is one area that needs legislation is protection for the dancer against unfair treatment. I never seen the contract a dancer has to sign when she works at a club. My guess is basically contains a list of costs she has to pay to work, a code of conduct, and tax information. I’d be curious if there are any clauses that guarantee a minimum number of stage sets, a dressing room chair, or even indoor plumbing. She probably has probably paid for the opportunity to get naked.
I would estimate most dancers are in their early twenties. That’s not age when most people are willing to negotiate for a job. They’ll pretty much take what ever get offered to them. That’s a recipe for abuse. I think a dancer should be guaranteed a certain amount of time on stage for fees. That would at least prevent owners from overloading the rotation for a given shift. I know some clubs limit the number of girls that can work a shift, but a lot don’t. There should also be basic safety requirements. The dancer should not have to worry about falling through a ancient stage fixed with duck tape.
I doubt they’ll ever be any legislation for this. To sponsor something like this would be to endorse stripping. Most politicians wouldn’t go near this. Never mind that a lot of dancers are single moms. God forbid you do anything to help them. If owner is being a sleazeball I hope she wins the case.
Ultimately you get paid for doing a job because if they didn’t pay you, you wouldn’t do it. You trade your skills and labor for either money or item of equal worth. At first glance this would seem to back up the dancer’s law suit, why should she have to show up and work with no compensation. Worse yet, she has to pay to work there. The difference is the potential for making money. Dancer’s have the opportunity to make money from the job of dancing. The potential for money is great enough that it’s worth her while to pay the money. That’s the major difference between myself and a dancer. There is no realistic way I can directly sell my services and make money. I have to be associated with a larger group of people manufacturing a product. Because I can’t make money I magically have to be compensated? No, if they didn’t compensate me I wouldn’t do it. I love my job, but not enough to do it for free. Nobody would.
How is the dancer’s job different that a hair stylist? Depending on the salon the stylist has to rent a chair, provide her own tools and supplies, and does not draw a wage from the salon. She makes her money from her customer base that comes in. The salon provides a set of services and large capital equipment for rent. To some extent she has to reply on the salon to promote itself, but much like a dancer she can use social networking to promote herself as well. If the stylist doesn’t make any money should the salon pay her a minimum wage? What about real estate agent?
In many ways if she wins the case it would be landmark ruling. I don’t think she stands much of chance of getting any money, provided that club didn’t do anything shady. Unfortunately that’s a big if. If there is one area that needs legislation is protection for the dancer against unfair treatment. I never seen the contract a dancer has to sign when she works at a club. My guess is basically contains a list of costs she has to pay to work, a code of conduct, and tax information. I’d be curious if there are any clauses that guarantee a minimum number of stage sets, a dressing room chair, or even indoor plumbing. She probably has probably paid for the opportunity to get naked.
I would estimate most dancers are in their early twenties. That’s not age when most people are willing to negotiate for a job. They’ll pretty much take what ever get offered to them. That’s a recipe for abuse. I think a dancer should be guaranteed a certain amount of time on stage for fees. That would at least prevent owners from overloading the rotation for a given shift. I know some clubs limit the number of girls that can work a shift, but a lot don’t. There should also be basic safety requirements. The dancer should not have to worry about falling through a ancient stage fixed with duck tape.
I doubt they’ll ever be any legislation for this. To sponsor something like this would be to endorse stripping. Most politicians wouldn’t go near this. Never mind that a lot of dancers are single moms. God forbid you do anything to help them. If owner is being a sleazeball I hope she wins the case.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)