I think if it "ain't broke, don't fix it." The reality is Yaa Hall Y'all has over 100+ people in most classes over three days. By their estimation, they are only losing a few by not doing a la carte, but saving in their administrative costs and staffing costs for this events (yes, I talked to them about this when this thread came up last year, or possibly even the year before, on tribe.) The reality is it takes double the staff to have a la carte or die-hard staff that will sit in one spot for hours on end to "man the doors." You would be surprised how many participants come late and come and go at an event. Someone has to be there to check admittance via armband or ticket system each time they enter again. Also, all the added paper, website work and probably many other hidden costs and occurrences I am not considering right now don't make it cost effective for a system that isn't broke to change. If they made it a la carte and raised the rates to offset the added costs possible as many people (or more) as are currently not attending because of no a la carte, would not be able to attend due to the price change and the sense of losing the value from the package deal. You just can't please everyone. If there numbers suddenly dropped and they could not attribute it to other factors, I think they would definitely consider changing the policy if it were at all cost possible.

On the positive side, can't we all find benefit from taking from many instructors? I think trying an instructor even more than once is in order if they are teaching general skills formats. You can't ever work on technique and basics too much and I too often see people glossing over this much needed re grounding to take from the latest "it" instructor and will only study with them once cause they are so on to the next big thing. I like the "it" instructors/dancers too, but I have my tried and true instructors that I take from every chance I get and they are often not at the top of the current "heap". We always learn something in any situation, even if it is simply what we don't like or don't want to be. Myself personally, I always walk away with more than I ever expected to "get" from an instructor's class that I thought I wouldn't like. Besides, if I make it through the class I wanted and take some of the class that just came along with the package I feel totally justified in leaving early or going shopping ;) if I got what I wanted from the day.

Okay, now let's talk dollars and cents ;) I went to the website so we could talk specific, accurate YHY figures. $255 - 3 days of workshops/6 hours a day, plus two nights of show tickets. Broken down into an hourly rate, less a show ticket of $12 and $20 taken out, is a total teaching cost of $232. This further breaks out into an average hourly teaching rate of $12.39/hr. The national average is somewhere between $15 - $25 right now.

For comparison sake, let's look at the most recent Fifi/Dr. Mo workshop hosted by Little Egypt. I also went to their website for the prices. $354 - 2 days of workshop/6 hours a day, plus 2 nights of show tickets. Broken down into an hourly rate, less a show ticket of $15 and $85 (dinner included) taken out, is a total teaching cost of $21.17/hr. I don't know how accurate this breakdown is because I do not know the cost breakdown of show versus dinner costs. But this is just for comparison anyway ;)

I brought all of this up to show that costs have to be higher for a la carte in most cases. (disclaimer: there could certainly be more reasons for costs differences, i.e. where stars travel from, how many instructors, etc). On the LE a la carte you can take the headliner for $100 for 3 hours. On the YHY ticket, you can take the headliner's day for $115. So for $15 would anyone really pass up studying with a master instructor? Well, me thinks that might be because of principal or because you don't like that style or whatever, but is it really because of the $15? Maybe for a few it really is and that is a shame, but the workshop costs was probably better spent on necessities then anyway right?

I am sure I have over simplified. I like both these sponsors and ALL of their events. I support, attend, participate and perform in ALL of them. These are simply my opinions and observations as a long time participant and event sponsor myself. <steps into asbestos undies, prepares for flamage ;) >