Daddy's Fish BowlA Clear View Of A Father's Family Experiences

Ever since Tre was born, people have been telling us that he needs to be a baby model; and as soon as they spend 5 mins around Ty, we hear “he was born to be on TV”.  At first, I just figured people were being kind, you know those are the type of things you’re supposed to say about kids.  After hearing it time and time again, I reconsidered the validity of what friends, family, and complete strangers were saying and thought, maybe so.  I went on a personal crusade to find a legit, reputable, modeling agency to represent the boys and needless to say, I came up empty on more than one occasion.  But yesterday, I thought we hit gold with the American Mall Model Search; sadly, in the end, it turned out to be just another rip off (in my opinion).  But this time, it wasn’t just Fefe & I who wasted our time and energy and got our hopes up for nothing; the kids were involved and lead to believe that they could be “stars”, and that pisses me off.  When I started this search about a year ago, I did tons of research that allowed me to determine that something just wasn’t quite right with the American Mall Model Search and I’m thankful that I was able to spot it out and not waste any money or additional time.  At the end of this post I’ll share some of the top things I’ve learned about the “industry” with you future Mommy & Daddy managers out there to hopefully save you some time & trouble.

A few weeks ago, a family member (who shall remain nameless) called Fefe and told her about this model thing at the mall and that her two granddaughters had gotten modeling contracts from it.  I was skeptical, but figured hey if it worked for them, why not give it a try.  We went to the mall and filled out the paperwork and within a few days got a call back with a date and time to come in and audition.  That time & date was yesterday at 7:15.  That’s primetime in our home, its after dinner and before the kids go to bed.  It’s our family bonding time and we decided to give it up for a shot at making it big time. Big Mistake!

As soon as we arrived at the mall and found the runway stage, red flags started going off almost immediately!  There were a bunch of teenagers there and EVERYONE was in skinny jeans, it was like a skinny jeans convention! Sidenote: I hate skinny jeans, and it ain’t because I’m not skinny. Then I notice that all of the skinny jean teenagers were actually working for the model search company.  They were signing people up and passing out numbers, etc.  As I looked around, I was unable to locate ANYONE over the age of 21 that was actually working. RED FLAG!!! Well, I decided to give it the benefit of the doubt, since we were a little early.  I assumed all of the adults and “qualified” talent scouts must be in the back or something. Well I was wrong, once it got started; the same teenagers were the only ones around and were running the show alone.  I immediately thought, how is a bunch of teenagers gonna determine who has what it takes to be a model and who doesn’t?  But again, dreaming big, I was able to rationalize it.  This was the preliminary rounds, so how much talent is really needed to weed out the really horrible contestants.  A word of advice: hope can often cloud your better judgment, so be careful.

Once the modeling hopefuls started walking the runway, it was absolute comedy!  I mean most of the people were down right BAD.  Not the kids of course, they were all cute and adorable.  But some of those adults should have been ashamed of themselves.  There was around 40 people trying out and of the 25 or so adults that went up there, I saw maybe THREE people that didn’t make complete fools of themselves.  During the auditions, I noticed that one of the teenage “judges” barely looked up from his paper at all; just constantly writing with a quick glance hear or there. RED FLAG!!! After the auditions, they were ready to announce the results.  They said that there were only 5 people who didn’t get picked. WHAT, ARE YOU SERIOUS?  Okay, I can understand picking all the kids (maybe) but there is no way that half of the people up there could have been seriously considered for a modeling contract. RED FLAG!!!

At this point, I’m still slightly hopeful, and still ignoring the red flags that keep waving at me.  They announce the adults first, and Fefe’s number is called, yayyy.  Then onto the kids, they announce their number one, top choice and when they call the number its none other than Tre, yayyyy! Then Ty’s number gets called, yayyyy!  We’re all winners, I knew it, my family has what it takes.  We were so super pumped because now we get to come back for the finals and do a photo shoot and talent portion.  We get the scoresheets and they have things like “cutie pie”, “cool smile”, “neat poses” written all over them. RED FLAG!!! I’m not a model agency excec, but I’m quite sure they have better, more official, terminology to use than the ones that were chosen to describe why my family members would make great models.

Finally, they bring us to the booth to “schedule” our finals audition and that’s where they lay it on us.  In order to move on to the finals, you have to participate in the photo shoot, and guess what, you have to pay for it!  $150 each for Ty & Tre, and $300 for Fefe. DING DING DING, so this is what all those red flags were trying to warn me about.  I explain to this teenager, they we already have professional photos (which we don’t, just wanted to see his response) and he tells me that we MUST use their photographers if we want to be entered in the finals.  That statement, combined with everything else that went on during the evening convinced me that the American Mall Model Search is a scam.  Why would they not mention this upfront? Why put us through this whole process, get our hopes up, get my kids excited about being stars, only to throw a $600 bill in our face for the POSSIBILITY of being selected in the finals?  Needless to say, I’m pretty pissed and hopefully this post will save other parents the headache of dealing with the bullshit associated with entering the model industry.

Signs That A Modeling Agency Is A Scam

They require professional photos for babies and small children – this is ridiculous, real agencies know that children’s looks change rapidily and will not force you to pay tons of money for photos that won’t look anything like your child 6 months from now

They only accept photos from their preferred photographer – modeling agencies make a percentage of their client’s earnings, so if they honestly thought you had what it takes, why force you to use their photographer? They should be able to take any profession photo and shop it around to find you a gig.

They require you to pay a fee before they will represent you – again, they get commission from the paying gigs that they find for you and that is the ONLY way a reputable, legit agency makes its money. 

There are a ton more, but I’m getting angry just writing about them.  If you’d like to know more, just email me and I’ll share all that I know