Cost of Being a Dance Mom: Receipts

Welcome to Show the Receipts, a series where we ask interesting people to share exactly how much it costs to get shit done. No matter the task, we’re tracking every last dollar from start to finish. Up next: being a dance mom.

Since Dana Thompson, 45, could remember, her daughter Kennedy, 13, had an innate love for dancing — whenever music played, Kennedy moved. At just 2 and a half years old, Dana enrolled her in a “Mommy and Me” dance class, which soon progressed to ballet, tap, and jazz combo classes. Fast forward 11 years, and Kennedy became a competitive dancer. For Thompson, what started as a single class ultimately became a $50,328 annual journey of being a dance mom.

“We tried other activities like soccer and Girl Scouts, but she always came back to dance,” Thompson tells PS. “She was naturally drawn to it.” Kennedy joined Studio Bleu Dance Center in Northern Virginia, and her passion quickly grew beyond weekly classes to include private lessons, outside training, and additional resources. “In the dance world, costs sneak up on you,” Thompson says, adding that she spent over $50,000 during the 2023-2024 competition season. “It seemed to grow exponentially every year.”

Despite the high costs, being a dance mom has become part of Thompson’s persona. She created a TikTok account where she shares behind-the-scenes content around being a dance mom, from costume hauls to “day in the life” videos. The account — which she says is a joint effort between her, her husband, and Kennedy — has amassed over 436,000 followers and millions of views. Any money earned from TikTok or brand deals goes toward “helping Kennedy achieve her goals and dreams,” such as the 16 group dances, two ballet variations, two duets, and three solos she participated in this year.

Reflecting on the last year’s costs, Thompson says, “If I could go back, I probably wouldn’t have let it get that high. But Kennedy has already built a foundation for herself when she turns 18 and steps out into the world — all because she’s a dancer. I couldn’t ask for anything more.”

Here’s the full price breakdown.

Task: Being a dance mom
Job: Finance and content creator
Location: Northern Virginia
Timeline: One dance season (September 2023 to August 2024)

The Receipts

Tuition: $15,447
Extra guest choreography: $1,350
Private lessons: $4,350
Online training: $540
Competitions: $7,978, including entry fees and travel
Costumes: $3,825
Conventions (3): $664, two covered through scholarships
Travel: $5,453
Summer intensive auditions: $145
NYC Ballet Summer Intensive: $8,447, housing included
Leotards, tights, pointe shoes, and other dance gear: $2,130
Total: $50,329

How I Did It

Being a dance mom is rewarding, but it isn’t cheap. Here, Thompson shares some of her takeaways and advice she’d give to other parents.

PS: What was the most surprising expense from the year?
Dana Thompson: Competition fees. I think the expectation is that you’ll pay a decent amount for tuition; you can see the investment there, you see the teachers, you take them to the class every day, and you can see how that money is being spent. But when you go to a competition and your kid’s on stage for two minutes performing a dance and you realize that that dance costs you $200 for two minutes — and that’s just the entrance fee, not counting the costume and accouterments — we’ve realized that might not be the best use of our money.

It hasn’t been the cost every single year since she has been dancing. It started with just a couple of dances here and there, but last year it became so expensive because we knew that was going to be her last year of competitive dance. She had decided that as she approached 14, she would focus more on ballet and less on competing, so we said, “Alright, whatever [dances] you’re invited to [this year], you can do.” As she was doing it, we didn’t add up every cost. It just grew, and it was so surprising that it got to that point.

PS: Where were you able to save money?
DT: We reused some of Kennedy’s most expensive costumes, like tutus, which cost over $800 alone. She also didn’t have as many custom costumes as she had in the past, so it was nice to save a little bit there. If the maker allows me to, I rhinestone her custom costumes myself to save on rhinestone fees. Or, we’ll buy essentials like leotards online and rhinestone them ourselves. The other stuff is hard to save — we must pay for the choreography and private lessons. I’m not a dance teacher, so I can’t teach her, but I can help with the costumes.

Kennedy is also unique in that she wears her regular makeup for competitions, which we buy anyway. She applies it a little heavier and adds red lipstick. So, it didn’t really cost us an enormous amount to buy any new competition makeup, and her hair products are also the same that she uses regularly.

PS: Do dancers with more resources have a better chance of winning competitions?
DT: I’d like to say yes because you would think, “Obviously, if a dancer is getting more training, then they are going to be more well-equipped for the competition.” That’s not true: it’s how and where you invest your money. If you’re in a very focused program and already getting amazing training, and you can purchase more in the way of privates and other outside resources on top of training, then you have an advantage. But if there are holes in the training and it isn’t geared toward how your child learns, and then you’re paying money on top of that, it won’t matter.

Final Thoughts

For Thompson, the price was worth it to watch Kennedy set and achieve goals, feel proud of herself, and be happy on stage with her friends. But, competitions don’t mean much in the real world, and winning a first-place award or title doesn’t equate to success, jobs, or cash prizes. “If folks are in it to win, then they are always going to feel like it’s money wasted,” she says.

Still, she admits that she probably didn’t need to spend as much as she did. She advises other parents that investing money into dance should look different for a child who dances as a short-term hobby versus a life-long pursuit. For Kennedy, Thompson has learned that paying for training is more valuable than competition fees, so they’ve decided to switch from a competition studio to a focused ballet school this season. Kennedy will still enter a few solo competitions this season because stepping on stage and performing makes the training more meaningful.

“You’re not bringing home thousands of dollars or scholarships to college because you won a dance competition,” Dana says. “But if your kid can take what they learned on that stage and apply it to the rest of their life, then that’s when they’ve really won.”