Adam used to come to my skating rink all the time and is also a good friend.

We’re also doing his wedding on October 16th…

He’s also a DJ for our company.

So of course his fiancé, and guest of honor tonight, Bethany became part of the gang.

As for everyone else? Quite a few worked/went to the skating rink and the rest I saw at Casey and Jeff’s wedding!

The setup was simple… couple of black lights, a Bliss, FatBeam lasers, Triphases… but the results were spectacular thanks to our amazing Hazer. This was held at the Bramble Ridge in Lakeland, where my wife‘s party was also thrown!

People drank. People danced. People drank. People danced more. People drank even more. You get the hint. Luckily, my good friends here are party drunks… they more they drank the harder they partied!

I will give you a warning on the video below.. it has some unedited music. Be careful watching this at work!

Video! (WARNING)

Click here to watch this in HD!

Christina did a great job pulling this all together.. and the food at Eaglebrooke was DELICIOUS!! Beth did a great job setting up the room as well!

Check out the pics and video below!

Click here to see it in HD

Then again, it should be. Natonia and Alfredo, with the help of Tarra Parnell, coordinator extraordinare, chose a dream team of Lakeland/Polk County vendors. Monica and I attended to music, lighting, and MCing. Jenny of KC Photography handled some exquisite shots. Tim and Patty Hicklin of Storybook Weddings took some cutting-edge video. Flowers by Marilyn did an amazing job with the linens and drapery and made Eaglebrooke look amazing. Beth and her staff did an amazing job, as always, offering top-notch service and food… and to top off an impeccable meal, a delicious cake was provided by Andrea of Sweetcakes!

The food… ohh man, you know I could go on for HOURS talking about how good it was. I’ll just say this: I had the salmon. The filet was easily a foot long, smothered in butter and light lemon juices, and fell apart the moment you looked at it hard enough. Delicious is an understatement here, folks!

Not only did it look beautiful, with our colorful uplighting and “Dance on the Clouds” feature, but it was a real fun party as you’ll see the video. (Lots of Latin music, too, helps being bilingual!) Three highlights are the soul train as the wedding party dance, Tarra’s son bustin’ out some MJ moves, and Natonia’s 90 year old grandfather moving it to some Earth, Wind, and Fire.

You just can’t rock any harder than that! Check out the photos and video below!

Package chosen:

• Entertainment Coordinator
• Dance Floor Lighting
• Uplights
• D’Elegance Under the Stars, custom (Sans Stars)

And two quick videos.. the first one shows the First Dance, courtesy of Storybook Weddings!

The second video is the event log.. check it out!

Watch in HD, click here!

I’m used to plenty of dancing during afternoon receptions; but this wedding transcended beyond that. Charles and I worked up quite a sweat watching this crowd. Even Michele and Rachel from R&M Photography were scrambling to get the action which spanned all over the Cleveland Heights Golf and Country club.

As usual, I enjoyed the food there followed by an amazing dessert by Its a Piece of Cake by Maggi. Delish! Thanks to Casey and Jeff for the extended invitation for the food!

So yes, check out the photos and AWESOME video below!! Please leave a comment– I’d love to hear your thoughts!!

And of course , the video! Click the link below it to watch it in HD!

WATCH IN HD

I left my camera at home by accident. DRAT! So today you get blessed with iPhone4 photos!

They were a fun group of guests… especially the groomsmen who sang every old school R&B song played during dinner. I wish I gotten the caterer’s name, though… the Chicken Cordon Bleu and roast beef were delicious… so savory! This wedding took a lot of planning, but they really pulled it off! Check out some photos and videos below!

Watch it in HD

Our market here is very diverse. I see DJs are high as $2,000 but mostly as low as $350. That figure scares me… not just as a DJ, business-man, someone that went through wedding planning for his own wedding… but mostly as a family man. How can someone charge $350 and make a living?

For those of you who are expecting me to tell you about how important we are to your wedding will not be happy with me. I’m not writing that at all! You already know this, otherwise you wouldn’t be reading anything I am writing. I’m going to tell you WHY we charge what we charge.

Here’s a cost breakdown for a small DJ package that can handle around 200 guests.
• Two speakers = $600/each (there are cheaper, but you get what you pay for. $600 is a very conservative number for a system that can handle 200 people.
• 1 year music subscription (multipled by the last 5 years) = $1,200
• Cheap Mixer = $300
• Cheap CD Players = $300
• WIRED (not wireless) Microphone = $100
• Tripods for speakers = $100
• Console (case to hold everything together) = $200
• Simple LED-based light show $400

Keep in mind, I didn’t add in gas, $2 million insurance policy and other business expenses, a computer (most DJs spin MP3s with a digital controller that works just like a CD player/turntables). That’s $3800 All rental companies charge at least 10% of cost. This means that to rent out this system at 10% it would be $380. In the last three years this number has averaged to about 20%. We’ll stick with a low 10%.

A simple equation to calculate price is equipment + talent = service price. Makes sense, right? Your DJ has business expenses (though he paid for the equipment, it doesn’t last forever), and he has many hours that he’ll add his talent to.

What does this conclude of our $350 DJ?

$350 (price of said DJ) take away the $380 is NEGATIVE $30.. This means the DJ either 1) values his skills at NEGATIVE $30 (or he’s paying YOU to work at your wedding) or 2) He’s bringing out low-grade equipment that won’t serve justice to the most important day of your lives. Oh, I didn’t mention.. but there’s TONS of business expenses: taxes, advertising, office capital, and non-event gas (for meetings). Even if they were booked 52 days of the year, that’s $18,200….

How can someone charge $350 and make a living? If you guesstimate the gross income after business expenses, you’d actually read “How can someone charge -$30 and make a living?”

Here’s something to think about: the numbers I gave you are for lower/middle-end equipment. We didn’t even touch on high-end brands such as EV, BOSE, or EAW that easily triple costs. Many entertainers have high-end lighting, video, or other special effects. Many of our weddings see over $20-30K worth of equipment! Many entertainers go to one or two yearly conventions to further their craft. Like any industry event, these conventions are NOT cheap.

So where do you start? Research DJs, or many will attempt to call or email you. The first question you ask should be: Are you a dedicated DJ company that specialized in weddings? What do you do to further your craft? Are you respected amongst your peers in the industry?

So how much should a DJ charge? Well, as you can tell… it all comes down to value of equipment plus value of talent. Equipment has a fixed cost, TALENT DOESN’T. Every DJ knows what he or she is worth. Once a DJ gives you a price, ask them why they charged you that. Was it low? Was it high? Was in between? A high price doesn’t mean a good DJ either… ask them for videos (recent, not some canned production in their office), client reviews, and even vendor reviews!

No formalities except a cake cutting and first dance… this was 6 hours of pure party!

Sounds exhausting? Not really… thanks to the amazing Orlando Wedding Team, headlined by Allison, Francesca, and Laura. They were great to work with. As for food… the Lake Nona Country Club has to be the best in the area; Lobster Ravioli, cheese ravioli, sushi, and Asian-spiced prime rib filled me up and left me craving more by the day’s end.

JR Sterling and Perfect Sky Productions shot photos and video… and these guys are a blast to work with! I’ll be sure to post a link to their blogs!

So yes, check out the photos and HD video (thank you, iPhone 4) below.

And the video! To watch it in HD, click here: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=412530994287&ref=mf

When I roll my console inside, I always get asked if I’m coming in to do magic tricks. LOL, it certainly does look like a magic box!

So what’s in this sucker? Click the link below for a fun read!

When unfolded, one lid turns to a table with a built-in skirt and power underneath. It’s a very clean and elegant look. Many clients are pleased that I’m in and out in 15 minutes so I don’t take anyone’s important time up as they watch me break things down.

You can see the pop up monitor held by an old rack drawer that I converted into a locking mechanism so the monitor stays up. Below that you’ll see the mixer, controller (this controls my music files on my computer just like CDs) and controller for the CD players.

When you open the drawer up, you’ll see the keyboard along with a keyboard light that folds up when I close the drawer. Inside the drawer I have mints, cologne, about 100 business cards, and index cards with a pen for any important notes I need to jot down.

Below the drawer is a blank space. Below that you’ll see a DriveRack. This unit has a compressor/gate/limiter/AFS/crossover. Basically, this unit makes the system sound clean, sharp, crisp and has many settings for many different rooms. You can rest assured that my system will sound its best for your chosen location!

Below that is my microphone that will NOT interfere with the new 700Mhz change in the airwaves. Your event will NOT be interrupted by emergency signals!

Below this is a power conditioner, CD players, and a custom built server I made that functions as a DJ workstation. This computer is beyond fast!

And the back… sure it’s a LOT of wires, but each wire is individually wrapped up. You can undo one wire and yank it off while leaving the others intact!

And that’s it! This unit controls music, lighting, music videos, and karaoke!

Did it stop anyone? Nope. They only danced faster, harder, and sang a LOT louder! This is by far the most high-energy wedding I’ve ever done. Scratch that, make it the most high-energy event you could imagine!! I have a few schools that I’m going to have to tell to step their game up in terms of energy!

Then again, Derek and I knew this was wedding was going to end in epic proportions (the last song was Peanut Butter Jelly Time). Irene is Greek and George is Mexican…. you heard right, two amazing families who are KNOWN for being in a culture that throws parties often shut down by authorities.

I’ve done Greek weddings. I’ve done Mexican weddings. They’re always loud, proud and lots of fun! I even did another Mexican/Greek wedding that required me to get 18 hours of sleep the next day in order to recoup. However NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING, could have prepared me for this night… there was just SO MUCH ENERGY!

Located at the beautiful Bilmar Beach Resort, where Justin and Megan had a very similar-paced reception, music was flying in and out of cue. How fast-paced where we? 18 songs in 15 minutes… the second video shows you this megamix. This wasn’t a rarity, this was ALL NIGHT with the exception of Greek music which should never be mixed. Leave culturally-revelant traditions alone, I always say!

Check out the amazing photos, then videos below!! MUST WATCH! Treasure Island (or is it St. Pete Beach?) will never be the same again!

This is the main gig log… watch it full screen, it’s an HD video.. thanks to my new iPhone 4!

Remember that 18 song mix in less than 15 mins…? It’s below.. and it’s a must-watch!