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mjx01

Aspiring Global Hound

I was at a club recently where they were celebrating their One Millionth customer through the door. As a math nerd this got me thinking...

Let us assume that the One Millionth customer thing isn't a load of SS in the first place.

Based on what the DJ was saying, the club has been open for approx. 18 years.

18 years x 52 weeks per year = 936 weeks.
1,000,000 customers / 936 weeks = avg. 1,068 customers per week

Granted, many of those are repeat customers. (This particular club is on the outskirts of a small city. ~1k customers per week strikes me as really high for this club based on what I see these days, but that's not to say things weren't better during economic boom times and drag the average up.)

To be conservative and to make the following hypotheticals easier, I rounded that down to 1,000 customers per week.

Avg enter of $15 per person x 1,000 customers per week = $15,000 entry fee revenue per week
$15,000 entry fee revenue per week x 52 weeks = $780,000 entry fee revenue per year
(and add on to that any house fees from the dancers to work there on top of that)
(Maybe that's why it seems like any idiot can run a strip club???)

There are typically 15-20 dancers on shift on Fri/Sat nights and about 7-8 dancers on Sun and on day shifts. We know that there are more customers during prime time (Fri & Sat Night), but I'm also going to assume that 'regulars' are spending at other times to help even things out. To estimate the total equivalent dancer slots on the club's schedule I weighted the Fri and Sat night shift by a factor of 2 account for more total dollars spent Fri and Sat night. So,

(12 shifts * 8 dancers per shift + 2 shifts * 20 dancers per shift * 2 weighting factor) = (96 + 80) = 176.

Which would imply roughly 45% revenue Fri and Sat night and 55% revenue all other shifts combined. (Not unreasonable IMO.) Now, let's round that to 180 equivalent schedule slots (ESS) going forward.

Next, I assumed that the average customer would spend some money beyond the cover charge. Obviously this is hard to estimate. Some guys are rocks, others are whales, and everything in between. For the sake of this thought experiment, I assumed that the AVERAGE customer spent $18 dollars in tips.

$18 in tips per customer * 1,000 customers per week = $18,000 tips per week
$18,000 tips per week / 180 ESS per week = $100 tips per ESS.

How reasonable is that? Let's assume Bambi works Tues, Thurs, and Sat night. That's 4 ESS because Sat night has a 2x weighting factor. That's $400/per week in three shifts. Assuming 6 hr shifts, that is a tad more that $22/hour. Not terribly unreasonable, but probably on the high side. $20tips/per rotation seems doable Fri/Sat night but with 20 dancers you'd be looking at a 2+ hr rotation. Realistically, a dancer would need $40 per stage set Fri/Sat night (1 set every two hours) for this to make more sense. The bigger short coming in this is that I don't see $20 per hour average mid week day shifts happening at this club.

Next I assumed the average customer would probably like a dance. Once again, this is hard to estimate. Some guys are rocks, others are whales, and everything in between. For the sake of this thought experiment, I assumed that the AVERAGE customer gets the equivalent of one dance (i.e. rooms and other setups count as multiple dances; the guys buying rooms offset the rocks).

1 dance equivalent per customer * 1,000 customers per week = 1,000 dances per week
1,000 dances per week / 180 ESS = 5.55 dances per ESS.

I'm going to round that down to 5 dances per ESS since there can't be half of a dance and multiples of 5 are going to be easier moving forward. How reasonable is that? Remember that Fri and Sat nights a 2x weighing factor. 5 dances per ESS implies that the average dancer would have to deliver the equivalent of 10 dancers on a Fri or Sat night shift. Not impossible, but not what I'm seeing. Also, in a 6 hr shift, the average dancer would have to average out to about 2 dances per hours. Again, not impossible, just not what I see happening. Let's say that a 30 min room is the equivalent of 7 dances (7 dances x 4 minutes each). Making quota is suddenly a lot easier if a dancers sells a room.

Now, each dance is $25 with $10 to the house and $15 to the dancers. Sticking with the 1,000 dances per week idea...

$10 for the house * 1,000 dance equivalents per week = $10,000 per week
$10,000 per week * 52 weeks = $520,000 per year
$520,000 cut from dances + $780,000 entry fee = $1.3 Mil in club revenue per year (That worked out to a nice round number, yah!)

Let's assume Bambi works Tues, Thurs, and Sat night. That's again 4 ESS because Sat night has a 2x weighting factor. That's 20 dances per week.

20 dances * $15 cut each = $300 per week.
$300 in dances and $400 in tips = $700 per week.
(Which is bit upside-down IMO. I would expect dances to big a bigger share of the take.)
$700 per week * 52 weeks = only $36,400 per year (which is nowhere close to claims of 6 figures)

Now, I think $700 per week is reasonable. I've known dancers who told me they were making $700 a week. But these were higher tier dancers and were working more than 4 ESS per week.

So... In conclusion, I can't say for sure how good any of these numbers are. This was mainly a thought experiment while bored out of my mind while stuck in a hotel room. Maybe I'm hanging out at the 'wrong' clubs, but I don't see how a dancer gets to $100k per year or $1k in a night for that matter.