Subscribe to the Network4 Rules to Follow to Make Sure Break-Even Events Actually Break Even
Many of our youth ministry events are what we consider “break even” events – essentially what we charge students should ideally cover the cost of the event so we don’t to rely on our youth ministry budget. Times are getting tight (hence strong sales of The $5 Youth Ministry and see the latest poll results) so every dollar counts. Recently we had an event that unexpectedly cost us quite a bit of money, and here are the tweaks we talked about in the debrief to make sure it doesn’t happen again:
RULE #1: Buying in advance is wise, if you’re careful.
Reserve conservatively in advance. I’m all for saving money – and usually booking something as a block, as a group or in advance will all net substantial savings. But big savings don’t matter if you can’t fill the seats. Remember only to reserve that you can for sure fill – you don’t want to be the youth worker forcing kids to go because you’ve still got 98 tickets to the baseball game or 32 spots left on the bus to summer camp.RULE #2: It is always easy to add a few more.
Plan for a few less than you think will be there. Too often as youth workers we get optimistic about how many people will be there, so we plan a significant’y larger budget than what actually showed up. Hence, lots of leftover pizza and the event doesn’t come close to breaking even. Be sure to never run out of pizza, but make sure you really strive for an accurate number when working on your first draft budget.RULE #3: Something will come up.
Build in a little contingency. Something will most definitely come up – so plan for it. Take 5% of your event budget, and don’t assign it to anything. Gas prices go up, but you’ve got a little in reserve. A few students couldn’t pay, but you let them in anyhow, so now there’s expenses with no income to offset it. But you created a little contingency – and if you do have any leftover at the end, take a volunteer out for lunch as a thank you for serving at the event.RULE #4: Charge a little bit more
If you charge just a little bit more, it could make a big difference. Just remember that each dollar is an impression you’re giving off, so the cost on a flyer is still very much a big deal – charge too much and people can’t afford it, and too many high-priced events lead to people forming an opinion of the type of student that is expected to attend the program. But there’s little difference in $25 or $30 for joining a small group, and camp at $314 might just as well be $329.
What else can we do as youth workers to help break-even events break even?
JG
