A prop inventory that matches the crate

A working crate is not a shopping list. It is a promise that the act on paper can be built at the venue. Magicians lose that promise in a notes app: six decks, one set of rings, silks that were “somewhere in the trunk,” a reel that needs repair and still travels because nobody marked it.

Circus artists know this in their bones — a hoop, a silk, a mat, a backup carabiner. Musicians know it as backline. Clowns know it as a case that must survive a garden party. The discipline changes. The book does not: what it is, whether it is safe to use, how many you have, and where it lives when you are not on the road.

This is a practical inventory for live entertainment, not a museum catalogue. Housecue keeps it private, per account, and builds a packing list from the cue sheet so the crate is a consequence of the act.

The five fields that earn their keep

You can track a hundred columns. You will not. Working inventory is five honest fields, and a sixth if you care at tax time.

• Name — the object as you pack it (“8-inch linking rings,” not “rings”).
• Category — close-up, parlor, stage, costume, lighting, sound, set, other.
• Condition — excellent, good, fair, needs repair.
• Quantity — how many you actually have, including backups.
• Location — tour case A, costume trunk, the shelf at home.
• Purchase cost — optional, for insurance and year-end.

Notes can hold the rest: “always carry two backups,” “quiet cloth wrap,” “do not fly this silk outdoors.” If a note is required for the method, it also belongs on the cue, not only on the prop.

Categories that match how you pack

Do not invent a taxonomy you will not use in a hallway. Close-up lives in a jacket and a small case. Parlor needs a table. Stage needs volume. Costume is not a trick and still misses the van. Lighting and sound are how the room fails you. Set is everything too big to call a prop.

A mentalist’s billets do not belong next to a circus aerialist’s silks, but both belong in the same kind of book. If you work more than one craft, keep one inventory. Split by category, not by ego.

Condition is a safety line

“Needs repair” on a reel, a hoop, a cable, or a flame item is the difference between a confirmed parlor and an apology — or worse. Condition is not vanity. It is whether the object may leave the house.

Housecue surfaces condition on the packing list. If a cue needs the rings and the rings are fair, you still see it. If they need repair, you have a chance to swap the piece before load-in. That is cheaper than a story in the car.

Cues pull the crate, not the other way around

The useful trick is to stop maintaining two lists. Write the show as cues. Attach a prop to each piece. Let the booking print what must leave the house. Unattached cues are gaps. Extra props in the case that no cue uses are weight. Both are information.

When the night has a run of show, the crate summary sits under the clock: name, where it lives, how many. You pack from a phone in the hallway, or from paper if the venue has no signal. That is the only filter that matters at 16:00 on a Saturday.

Backups are inventory, not folklore

“I always carry two decks” is folklore until quantity is two — or six — and location is tour case A. Write the backup as quantity, not as a superstition. If the opener eats a card, the number on the book should still be enough for the closer.

What not to put on a public gear page

A public list of what you own tells other acts what you bought and tells thieves what is in the boot. It also dates you. Inventory in Housecue is visible only after you sign in, the same as clients and fees. If a sponsor needs a rider, send a rider. Do not publish the warehouse.

Rehearsal holds three props so you can try the idea on a real parlor. Studio Pro is for the full case. Open a studio and name what you actually carry — then attach it to the cue sheet so the crate and the act stop arguing.

Home stock versus what travels

Not everything you own should leave the house. A practice reel, a broken hoop, a costume from an old act — those can stay in inventory with location “home” and a condition that forbids the van. The packing list should only pull what a cue on tonight’s show attached. That is how you stop packing the museum.

Touring stock lives in named cases. If you cannot say which case without opening it, the location field is empty in spirit even if you typed something. “Tour case A” is a place. “Somewhere” is how the silk stays on the stairs.

Insurance, cost, and the unromantic column

Purchase cost is optional until a case is stolen or a silk burns. Then it is the only column the insurer understands. You do not need a museum valuation. You need what you paid, roughly, and a date if you have it. Circus apparatus and musical instruments belong here as surely as a deck.

Do not put insured values on a public page. Do not photograph the open trunk for social media with your address in the background. Inventory is an operations file. Treat it like one.