The Danger of Comparing Budgets

DRTV production can go from the very simple to the very expensive.

By Jim McNamara

Potential DRTV marketers often ask producers, "Can you give me a budget?"

When I was first starting out in the DRTV business, I used to get this question a lot. It always came when I was at my busiest, but I'd scurry around, frantically getting numbers together, worrying and postponing other jobs.

But then one day I realized, most of these potential clients aren’t really interested in the bottom line number I give them. 

What they are really asking in this question is, “How can I compare your work with somebody else’s? “

Today, I simply tell the truth: I don’t have time to give you a budget breakdown. And you really shouldn't be asking for one from any other producer. Here's why:

Budgets Take Time

To develop a meaningful budget for you, a producer needs to do a lot of work. 

He needs to know a lot about your product, the concept for the show, the resources you'll bring to the party, today's talent market, and so on.

A good budget takes nearly a week to produce. And that's after you have a strong outline for the show, which in itself takes a week or two.

Now, no busy producer can afford to invest that kind of time in a "maybe" project. Sure, he can recycle old budgets, or guess-timate for you, or, dare-I-say-it, lie to you.

But to do any of these things, the producer will have to make so many assumptions, the budget he gives you will be practically meaningless.

Hard to Compare

And even if you get 8-9 budget breakdowns, how will you evaluate them, anyway?

Remember, you've asked producers to budget your show without much input from you. They may have no idea of what kind of show you're looking for, or capable of financing. So the producer guesses about a lot of things.

• One producer may have envisioned a talk show.

• Another might have been thinking about a show with lots of locations and testimonials.

• Another producer might have thought you wanted some really outstanding celebrity host.

• And still another might have thought you really were serious when you said you wanted to make the best-looking infomercial ever.

Not the Same Show

Now, since each producer has had to make his own guesses about important variables, you'll end up with eight or nine breakdowns. But they'll all be for different shows!

You'll have your breakdowns, all right. But it will be almost impossible to compare them. 

(Hey, I've been a producer for 25 years, and it would be hard even for me to do.)

And even then, even if you could somehow compare those 8-9 budgets and their underlying assumptions, you still can't really compare.

Which to Choose

Do you pick the lowest budget, the middle one, the one that gives you the most shooting-days-per-dollar?

What if the "best" budget comes from the least-creative producer or some producer middleman who just sub-contracts jobs out?

A Better Way

If I were the marketer, I'd forget about this mass call-for-budgets idea and, instead, choose a writer-producer this way:

• Find the person (not just the  production company) who understands DRTV creative and has sold a lot of your type of product.

• Determine if you like working with him, if he has smart ideas.

• Hire him to do the necessary research and write an outline for the show. Give him a ballpark idea of what you can afford to spend.

• If you like his outline, if you believe it is the absolute best way to sell your product, have him complete the script.

• From the outline and budget, have him (or even another producer) figure out what it will cost to turn those great-selling ideas into reality. In other words, have him do a true, honest-to-goodness budget that really means something.

Let me condense this even a little further: f I were the marketer, I'd first look for a writer-producer who can really sell, then I'd worry about the costs to make it happen later.

Good luck!

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