Booking and routing a tour
A tour is booked by an agent and built as a route. The agent secures the offers and negotiates the fees; the routing turns those dates into a sensible path that doesn't waste fuel and days. Good routing is the difference between a tour that breaks even and one that bleeds money.
The agent books, the manager oversees
The booking agent is the one who secures show offers, negotiates guarantees and terms, and builds the routing – typically for around 10% of the gross show fees. There’s a legal reason it’s the agent and not you: in regulated states, only a licensed agent can legally book work, and a manager who books shows can have the management contract voided. The clean division is the agent books, the manager strategizes and oversees, and the tour or road manager runs the actual dates.
Routing: the path matters as much as the dates
A tour isn’t just a list of good shows – it’s a route. The principles:
- Move in one direction – head out hitting progressively farther cities, then circle back through new ones. Zig-zagging wastes fuel and time.
- Keep drives reasonable – ideally under about 300 miles (4–5 hours) between show days, and avoid the brutal 8-hour-plus hauls. The realistic distances vary a lot by region.
- Build in days off – roughly one per 5 or 6 shows, partly because Sundays and Mondays are hard to book anyway.
- Route around anchor dates – a confirmed festival or major-market show is a fixed pin you build around. Watch the radius clause: festivals often bar you from playing nearby for a window around the date (a “90/90” – 90 miles, 90 days – is common).
Routing isn’t cosmetic. A tour’s margin depends on booking density, and bad routing adds unpaid driving days and burns the budget on fuel and hotels.
Holds, offers and advancing
The mechanics of locking in a date:
- A hold reserves a date with a venue. Several acts can hold the same date (first hold, second hold), and a holder can be “challenged” to confirm or release within a day or two.
- An offer (the offer sheet, then contract) sets the deal and the logistics – fee, ticket price, load-in, soundcheck, set length – with the technical and hospitality riders attached.
- Advancing is confirming every logistic with the venue ahead of the date: production, parking, schedule, hospitality, and how payment will be made. It’s what stops show-day disasters – arriving to no backline, or a show neither side promoted.
Lead time
Most tours come together 3 to 6 months out. Bigger rooms book further ahead – sometimes up to a year – while small clubs run on 1 to 3 months. The less familiar the markets and the bigger the venues, the earlier you start. Once it’s booked, the work shifts to making the run pay: tour budgeting.
Common questions
- Who books a tour, the manager or the agent?
- The booking agent. They secure offers, negotiate guarantees and build the routing, for around 10% of the gross show fees. In regulated states only a licensed agent can legally book work – a manager who books shows can risk voiding the contract. The manager strategizes and oversees; the agent books.
- What is tour routing?
- Building the run as a geographically sensible path – moving in one direction, keeping daily drives reasonable (often under ~300 miles), building in days off, and routing around anchor dates like festivals. Bad routing burns fuel, time and money and can sink a tour's economics.
- How far ahead do you book a tour?
- Commonly 3 to 6 months out, more for larger venues (which can book up to a year ahead) and less for small clubs (1 to 3 months). Headline routing and unfamiliar markets need the most lead time.