Private Parties and Bachelor Gigs: Bring Your Own Bouncer

Never work a private party without your own security in the room, paid in full before you start, with a location you checked, a way out you control and a rule that you leave the moment anything differs from what was agreed. A bachelor party pays well because the club's cameras, bouncers and house rules are not there; everything the club does for you, you now have to do for yourself. The dancers who do these gigs for years treat the bouncer as the first cost of the job, not an optional extra, and the ones who got hurt almost always went alone.

Safety first: the room has no cameras

In a club, a customer who crosses a line faces a bouncer in ten seconds. In a hotel suite with twelve drunk men, he faces you. Sky Hopscotch, a dancer interviewed by the Irish Times, lists hiring a bouncer for private parties as basic practice, and the dancers who talk about this work agree: the bouncer is not for show. He is the person who stands by the door, who holds the money, who ends the party when you say it is over, and whose presence changes how a room full of men behaves before anyone has to be told anything. Dancers Information's guidance on difficult customers assumes you can call security. At a private gig, the security is whoever you brought.

Hire someone you know or who comes recommended by a dancer who has used him, pay him a flat fee from the booking, and brief him: where he stands, what the rules are, what the signal is for "we're leaving". Do not use a friend of the client. Do not use the groom's brother. Do not go alone because it is "a nice group".

Before you say yes

Screen the booking the way you would screen anything outside the club. Who is the contact, what is his real number, where is the venue, how many guests, what has he been told about what is on offer. Get it in writing, by text, including the price, the duration, the rules (no touching, no photos, no phones out during the show), and the deposit. A client who will not put the details in a text is a client who intends to argue about them later.

Check the location. A hotel suite or a rented house is normal; a private home in the middle of nowhere, a boat, or an address the contact is vague about is not. Dancers Information's travel guidance applies in full: know where you are going, tell someone, have your own way home. Search the address. If it is a house, look at it on a map before you agree.

Set up the check-in: one person who has the address, the contact's number, the time you expect to finish and a time by which they will call the police if they have not heard from you. Send "there", "started", "done", "home".

How much should I charge for a private party?

More than the same time in a club, and all of it up front. Dancers report quoting an hourly rate at two to three times their club rate plus the bouncer's fee and travel, and they are not apologetic about it: the client is paying for exclusivity, for you coming to him, and for the fact that there is no house taking a cut. A deposit of half at booking secures the date; the balance is paid in cash, counted by your bouncer, before you start. Lily T.'s rule for VIP, paid up front and no IOUs, is the rule here with no exceptions, because there is no house to collect from a client who refuses afterwards. Tips during the show go to the bouncer, who holds them. Nothing happens on a promise.

Add a line for extra time, priced per fifteen minutes, paid before the clock runs. Men at parties always want more time once it is going well, and a prepaid extension is the easiest money in the business.

Running the room

Arrive with your bouncer, scan the room, count the guests against the booking, and have the bouncer collect the balance before you go anywhere near the group. State the rules to the whole room, once, out loud, in the same form you use in the club (see /advice/rules-before-the-dance): hands where you say, no phones, the bouncer calls time. Pick the quietest corner with a clear path to the door and set up there. Keep your bag, your phone and your clothes with the bouncer, not scattered round the room.

The group dynamics are the club's group dynamics with the volume up. There is a joker performing for the others, and he will test the rules for a laugh; the dancer's diary on groups describes him exactly. He gets one correction, from you, and the second from the bouncer. The groom is usually the easiest person in the room and the best man is usually the one who booked and the one who will pay for extra time. Work them, ignore the joker, and let the bouncer deal with anyone who is a problem twice.

What if the party goes wrong?

Leave. That is the whole plan, and it is why the exit was planned before you walked in. Phones come out and stay out after a warning: leave. Someone touches after the bouncer has spoken: leave. The room has more people than the booking, or different people, or the mood has turned: leave. The money is already in your bouncer's pocket, so leaving costs you nothing but the extension you were hoping to sell. Do not argue, do not refund, do not stay to "finish the song". Walk to the car with the bouncer, drive somewhere lit, send the "done" text, and then decide whether anything needs reporting.

Should I do private parties at all?

They are good money for dancers who run them properly and bad risk for dancers who run them casually, and the difference is the list above. If you cannot afford a bouncer, you cannot afford the booking. If the client will not pay a deposit, he is not a client. If you would be going alone, to an address you have not checked, for a group you have not counted, the answer is no, however much he is offering. Some dancers do nothing else and earn well; others do one and decide the club's bouncers are worth every dollar of the house fee. Either is a reasonable conclusion. Going unprepared is not.

Do this tonight

• Find a bouncer through a dancer who has used one, before you need him.
• Write a booking template: price, duration, rules, deposit, address, guest count.
• Set up the four-text check-in with one person who will act if it stops.
• Put "balance in cash to my security before I start" in every quote.