Private karaoke rooms: 7 most frequently asked questions answered

Karaoke rooms (also called karaoke booths, karaoke boxes, KTVs) are a growing trend in the hospitality industry. At Singa, we've assisted multiple venues all around the world to get started with their karaoke room concepts and open karaoke room businesses. There are often multiple questions to answer. We've picked out seven most common questions and answered those in this article.

1) What type of interior should be considered for the karaoke room?

We at Singa are no interior designers; our expertise lies in creating the best possible karaoke software and service. However, we have gained valuable insights when working closely with our customers on karaoke room design. And we are here to empower your creative minds:

Our UK venues observe that 60-80% of their customer base for karaoke rooms is female (based on comments from Singa's customers). The skew is seen in our other markets, too. It would be then reasonable to consider having something fairly neutral or something appealing to the female counterpart.
For the "shy" customers to "dare" to sing and perform, it often helps to have some sort of an alter ego. That alter ego can often be triggered when stepping into an environment with an encouraging theme. Hence, theme your room!

2) What should be considered when putting up the rooms?

Don't make the room closed, have a window or glass door! Humans are a curious species! We are obsessed with peaking into each other's life (more than we'd like to admit 😅). Think about the time we spend on social media browsing through others' Instagram stories, for example.

Therefore, have the karaoke rooms designed to give people a sneak-peak into what is happening inside, how much fun people are having, what songs they are singing, and so on. Have a window or glass door where passerby can curiously look into.

Besides, it's important to keep in mind that the rooms tend to get really warm. Good ventilation in the room is, therefore, essential. Also, a basement rooms tend to be favorable as they are cooler (temperature-wise). You also need to think about your sound-proofing to not disturb other clients.

3) How about audio, TV-screens, and microphones?

Have some consultancy with your local AV hire, as they surely are the specialists on this topic. Nevertheless, we can offer a guidance for the basic setup for a karaoke room.

The song request station - for instance a Singa Business Pro iPad
One TV screen
One to two active speakers
A mixer
Two wireless or wired microphones

4) How much should we charge per karaoke room booking? Per group or per person?

This obviously depends on many factors: where you are located, who your target audience is, how premium you want to be.

A general rule of thumb is looking at how much people are willing to pay for other forms of entertainment. For example, you can compare it to the price of a single movie ticket for a newly released movie at your local movie theatre, or how much one hour of bowling costs at peak time.

Having a relatively low price for group bookings can be advantageous! This makes it easier for your staff when the room booking payment is done by the group and not per person.

You should also consider the customers' willingness to make extra purchases. A lower booking fee might encourage the guests to buy more snacks and drinks. And that leads to the next common question.

5) How can we make more money selling food and drinks with karaoke rooms?

From the revenue flow perspective, karaoke is a game of getting customers to spend more on food and drinks. Singing and performing are not only fun but also energy-consuming. As a result, people will need to eat and drink. Therefore, we recommend making snacks and drinks available for your customers. Some tips here are:

Offer drink packages. A bucket of beer or bottles of sparkling are popular choices. Those drink packages tend to be consumed quickly. It is then important to have the ordering systems easily accessible for the customers.
Digital menus increase in popularity. There are multiple service providers that offer a digital menu and ordering system for restaurants. Have that available so that guests can order more drinks to soothe their dry throats after all the singing.
Advertize your food and drink offers. This needs no further explanation. It only does you good to have your food and drink offers visible in the room either in the form of printed menu on the table, tabletop display, or better, on the TV-screen. Singa karaoke system has a built-in ad display to help you with this. Do not hesitate to contact us if you want to find out more.

Fun fact: When humans eat and drink, our brain releases dopamine, a hormone that makes us feel good. The same hormone is also secreted when people sing and perform 😊🎤

6) How can we make the customers stay longer than the booked time?

At Singa, we have venues telling us that their typical customers tend to stay at the venue for 3 to 4 hours. Usually, these customers arrive at the venue first for food and drinks, and after that, they spend additional hours in the karaoke rooms to sing their hearts out. 3-4 hours is a relatively long time in a competitive market like hospitality.

On another note, live stage karaoke can be a healthy addition to further encourage customers to stick at your venue or visit you more often. Maybe have the live stage karaoke available for free on weekends? Having live stage karaoke beside karaoke rooms could also help attract new customers that only prefer performing in public.

7) How many karaoke room bookings per week can be expected?

This is obviously dependent on how many days of the week you are open and how long booking slots you offer.

An hour booking slot tends to be fairly short. Time really flies when people sing and have fun in the karaoke rooms. That, however, isn't necessarily a bad thing. The group that booked only for an hour for the first visit would mostly extend their booking (if extra time slots are available), or book two hours for their next visit.

From my experience helping venues develop their karaoke rooms concept, here are a couple of tips for you to get more bookings for your karaoke rooms:

Offer a discounted booking fee on weekends
Perhaps you have a university near by where you can attract students (with student discounts)
Do active marketing and sales towards companies nearby for their after-office parties or team-building activities.

And there you have it: answers to the seven most frequently asked questions about karaoke rooms.

Feel free to contact us if you want to get more insights into making your karaoke room concept thrive. You can chat with us on www.singa.com/business or email us at sales@singabusiness.com.