Don't be intimidated by the financial aspects of presenting. If you balance your personal checkbook and keep your home finances in order, you won't find the budgeting process difficult.

If you plan to present a number of shows throughout the year, you should create an annual project budget that includes all the revenues and expenses for your program. If you are presenting a single event, an event budget is all that you need. The budget for presentations (one or many) will include sources of “revenue” (money in) and areas of “expense” (money out). Sounds simple, doesn’t it? It is.

It is a good idea to create a template for your budget right from the beginning and use it as a planning tool when you are starting to think about your programming choices. In addition, the line items in a budget can serve as a good checklist for you throughout the process!  

The Event Budget

For an individual event, "revenue" is probably limited to ticket revenue and, possibly, revenue from merchandise sales commissions, concessions and program advertising. However, many presenters choose to record these last three revenues separately from the event. “Expenses” are the direct costs of producing the show. 

Your event budget will have several phases:

1. You will first create a “rough budget” to assist you in determining if the artist you are considering is at a fee range that is possible for your organization. 
2. Your next version of the budget will have more detail – you will be using it as a planning tool as you undertake the negotiation and contracting process. 
3. Your final budget will be the most detailed and refined. 

Sample Event Budget [PDF]

Annual Presenting Budget

The annual presentation project budget is simply a compilation of each of the separate event budgets, combined with additional sources of revenue and additional overhead expenses for executing a year’s program (e.g., office or payroll).

Sample Annual Budget [PDF]

Revenue

While ticket sales are usually the primary revenue stream to cover your expenses, there are other revenue streams that may come into play. 

Expenses

In addition to the artist fee, there are a myriad of expenses involved in a presentation. 

Your budget as a tracking tool

Your budget can be a place where you can keep track of how you are progressing throughout the year. To do this, make 4 columns labelled: 

1. Budget: where you put the initial budget you have created. 
2. To-Date: where you can record your expenses as you receive actual invoices.
3. Projected: will include all the estimated expenses you learn about.
4. To-Date and Projected Columns added together: this is the number to compare to your original budget so you can see how your costs are coming out. 

When the show is done, the "To-Date" column will have all your expenses, your projected column will be empty and your total of these two columns will have the final costs in it, easy to compare to line by line to the original budget projection.

Err on the side of caution
Don’t forget, it is always best to be on the cautious side when making a budget. Some presenters will put in a contingency line on both the revenue and expense line to provide some “wiggle room” for cost overruns or revenue shortfalls.