Concierge market report: supply, pricing and lead times

The headline number in this category is usually the size of a firm's network. The more informative one is how many firms a given market actually has. Across the markets tracked here, 9 resolve to exactly one indexed firm and 40 to none at all, while the deepest markets carry several times that.

The practical consequence for a buyer is that choice is largely an illusion outside a handful of cities. In most markets the question is not which provider to select but whether the one operating there can do what is being asked, and that changes what the first conversation should be about.

Of 18 firms indexed, 6 carry any fee figure at all, and most of those figures come from third-party reporting rather than from the firm. 12 publish nothing checkable. That is not evasion so much as how the category prices: an undertaking to absorb unspecified volume cannot carry a shelf price.

Where several publications do report on the same firm, their ranges frequently do not overlap. Every reported range is kept here rather than averaged, because the disagreement is the finding. A buyer told a single confident number has been given a precision that no source supports.

The 112 fixtures tracked across 55 markets are not spread evenly through the year. March carries 19 of them, more than any other month, and November carries 6. That asymmetry matters commercially because provider capacity is roughly constant while demand is not: the weeks that are difficult for one client are difficult for all of them at once, and a retainer bought for a peak is idle for most of the rest of the year.

The shape of an individual market matters more than the national picture. 37 of the 55 markets here fit their entire calendar inside a four-month span, which makes them a single decision: cover that window or do not. The remainder distribute their pressure across the year, and in those markets coverage is either continuous or it is not really coverage at all. That distinction, rather than price, is what should decide the engagement model.

Fixture type is the third variable and the least discussed. Across the index the dates run to 36 distinct kinds of event, led by sport at 15 of 112. A provider's depth is category-specific, so a coverage claim that holds for sport says nothing about a fashion week, and the concentration of types within a market is the fastest way to see which relationships a firm would actually need there.

Of the 18 firms indexed here, 6 publish or have had published a fee figure of any kind, which leaves the majority with no price in the public record at all. The usual explanation is that the product is an undertaking to absorb an unspecified volume of work, and that the price depends on how much of a named manager is being bought. That is a real reason rather than an evasion, but it has a consequence: a buyer cannot form a reference price before the first conversation.

Firms know it.

The practical counter is to arrive with a volume estimate rather than a budget. Volume is the input every engagement model prices against, it is the one number a buyer genuinely knows, and quoting it converts an open-ended conversation into a comparison between structures. The rate estimator converts a monthly volume into the band each published model implies, which is the closest thing to a reference price this market makes available.

It also explains why the figures that do exist should be handled carefully. Most come from third-party reporting rather than from the firm, they describe different tiers, and they were published at different times. Where two sources disagree this site keeps both rather than averaging them, because an averaged figure would look more precise than anything anyone actually published.

Fees are set per firm and per tier and do not move between cities. Lead times move enormously. Across every fixture tracked here the median longest lead time is 12 weeks, and the range runs from 2 weeks to 40 depending on the market and the event.

That is the finding with the most practical weight in this report. It means the decision to engage someone has to precede the request that needs them, often by a season, and it explains why retained arrangements dominate in markets with crowded calendars while per-request arrangements make more sense in open ones.

Only firms that publish enough to be verified are counted. That excludes the single-operator businesses which make up much of the supply in smaller markets, so every firm count here is a floor rather than a census. The concentration finding above would soften if those firms were visible, though the direction would not change.

Nor does it measure quality, satisfaction or outcomes, none of which are published by anyone in a form that could be compared. What it measures is what can be checked: who says they operate where, what has been reported about what they charge, and when each market becomes difficult.