How Much Does Starting a Wedding DJ Business Cost?

by Chris Brower
Last Updated: March 25, 2024

I won’t lie: It can be expensive to start a wedding DJ business. However, you can quickly earn back that money after sometimes just a few bookings.

After all, couples will often happily spend $1,000, $2,000, or more to hire a wedding DJ for their big day.

Let’s say it cost you $2,000 to start your wedding DJ business. If you charge the shockingly low price of $500 per job, once you’ve booked four weddings, you’ve essentially made your money back. If you charge $1,000 per job, after two weddings you’ve made back your initial cost.

Making your money back after just a few bookings is a much easier prospect than starting a brick-and-mortar business where you have to pay huge expenses in building costs, staffing, and stocking products that sell for $5 or $10 each. Additionally, you don’t have to go to a costly school for years or obtain a license/certification to be a wedding DJ. You can start your wedding DJ business today!

So let’s take a look at what expenses you can expect when starting your wedding DJ business.

Equipment

Equipment is likely going to be your biggest expense. To get a great overview of all the equipment you need for a wedding DJ business, I recommend reading:

If you were starting from scratch and had to buy every piece of equipment, you could be looking at spending $1,000-$3,000+.

However, you don’t necessarily have to buy every single thing at once. For example:

You could probably get by with just one, relatively inexpensive DJ light, such as the Chauvet DJ Mini Kinta* for your lights setup. While lights typically look best when hung from light stands (rather than just set on the DJ table), you could wait to purchase a stand.
You could forgo a DJ facade. A DJ facade really cleans up your setup’s appearance, but it’s not a must-have either.
You could have just one wireless microphone instead of the three kinds of microphones I recommend. This may make things a little more challenging, but you could possibly get by.

Similarly, there are other ways to reduce costs:

Buy used equipment. Look for good deals online, or reach out to other local DJs and see if they have any equipment they’re looking to sell. That’s how I got two speakers and a backup laptop when I started – a local DJ sold them to me at a discount.
Rent equipment. Local music stores or audio companies may offer good equipment for rent at a reasonable price.
Borrow equipment. Maybe there’s a local band or church you could help out with their audio needs who would also let you borrow some of the equipment for your wedding DJ gigs.
Buy cheaper brands than the top-of-the-line manufacturers. Of course, don’t sacrifice quality!

And if you’ve been a musician, even as just a hobby, you may have some of the equipment already.

Also, you don’t have to own every piece of equipment before you book a wedding DJ job. That’s right – you could book a wedding (or several) before you’ve acquired any of your DJ equipment! You could then use the down payments from the bookings to help cover your start-up costs, including equipment.

For additional savings tips, check out How to Reduce Costs For Your Wedding DJ Business.

Ready for the complete guide to becoming a wedding DJ? Here you go.

Promotional

You may be lucky and be able to book wedding DJ gigs solely by word of mouth or free postings on social media. But most likely you’ll have to put some money into promoting your DJ business.

Here are common promotional expenses you may have:

Website. You need a website where people can read about your wedding DJ business – and something more than just a Facebook page. Luckily, you can build your own website fairly easily through sites like Squarespace, WordPress, Weebly, or others. You probably don’t need to hire someone or have vast coding knowledge. I built my Squarespace site myself. It was quite easy! I now pay approximately $200 a year for the web hosting and domain.
Online advertisements. Many couples turn to websites like The Knot and WeddingWire to find vendors. In fact, I book most of my jobs from The Knot. Paying for a first-page listing is crucial to actually getting inquiries through The Knot. These can be quite expensive though, often $200-$500 a month or more. It’s a lot. But if it nets you high-paying jobs, then it could be worth it. Some DJs also have great luck with paid advertising on Facebook, which can be worth trying too.
Bridal fairs. Bridal fairs can be quite expensive (often $1,000+), but they can sometimes get you a bunch of jobs at once, which can more than make up for the expense. I recommend waiting on bridal fairs until you have more experience. For more on bridal fairs, check out The Wedding DJ’s Guide to Winning at Bridal Fairs.

For help with promotion, be sure to read How to Promote a Wedding DJ Business.

Music

You need a lot of music as a wedding DJ! And you can’t just rely on streaming services like Spotify or Apple Music. You need to own your music.

Compiling all that music can be daunting on its own, but the potential cost can also be scary. Luckily, you can save money by buying a lot of compilation albums that get you a bunch of popular weddings songs for cheap. Similarly, you can subscribe to music pools (services where DJs can acquire music for a lower price). Make sure you’re using a legal service, such as Promo Only.

For tips on how to get music, plus reduce the expense, check out The Best Ways to Get Wedding DJ Music. And if you’re unsure what songs are a must-have, take a look at Fill the Dance Floor: The Most Popular Wedding Reception Songs.

Remember, you don’t have to have an mp3 of every single song ever. You can continually add to your collection over the years, as you will no doubt do. Plus, thanks to the Internet, you can often download (legally!) an mp3 in no time. Thus, if someone makes a song request that you don’t have, you can quickly purchase the song off iTunes or Amazon or wherever you like for often very little money.

So, for your first gig, how much will the music cost?

Let’s say you play on average 20 songs an hour (about 3 minutes per song). If you play music for 5 straight hours (cocktail hour, dinner, dancing), you’ll need 100 songs (5 hours x 20 songs per hour). mp3s currently cost about $1.29 each (though the price can vary). If you bought each mp3 one at a time, those 100 mp3s would cost $129.00. Of course, as stated earlier, you can often save money by buying compilation albums with several popular hits or by using DJ pools. So your real cost is likely lower.

And, of course, those mp3s will continue to work for future gigs, so you won’t have to acquire 100 new songs every time. So your initial music expenses may be large, but they will go down over time.

Other Wedding DJ Business Costs

As with any business, there are all kinds of other, miscellaneous expenses that may pop up. Some examples for a wedding DJ business include:

General liability insurance. It's a good idea to have general liability insurance to cover you in case someone gets injured by you or your equipment during a wedding. A common example would be someone trips over a cord and breaks their leg. (Obviously, do all you can not to let this happen, such as taping down cords using gaffer tape.) Some venues also require their vendors have general liability insurance. Others don't care. So sometimes it's not a must-have. But if you don't have it, you run the risk of an accident/injury costing you a huge amount. I spend about $200 a year for insurance from Insurance Canopy.
Credit card readers. If you choose to accept credit cards, you will have to pay for a credit card reader, plus the credit card company fees. If those fees scare you, you could only accept check/cash/etc. That's what I've done for more than 10 years, and it's gone fine! No fees to pay for accepting money. And almost all couples I've encountered have been okay with that instead of credit cards.
Gas. You'll likely be driving to and from weddings, which will naturally cost money in gas and car maintenance.
Taxes. You'll need to pay income taxes on the money you make from your DJ business. Be sure to keep track of all expenses, including car mileage, which can help reduce the amount of money you owe in taxes.
Clothes. You'll need a suit or other formal outfit to wear when you DJ a wedding. That's expected of wedding vendors. Luckily, you may have this already or can get something that looks nice for under $100.

Conclusion

Starting a wedding DJ business can be expensive. But luckily you can fairly quickly fund it with just a few bookings. Likewise, you don't have to buy every piece of equipment and undertake all expenses on day one. You could even book some wedding jobs before you've spent a cent or acquired any of the necessary equipment. And soon, thanks to the bookings coming in, you'll be on your way to making a nice profit with your wedding DJ business.

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