...am soooo glad Christiam has chimed in....my experience has been the same...the point is when negotiating is to not offend (yes funny that coming from me)..when they ask for 1500 you reply with a laughing emoji that you are not rich...or that he must be very high class to charge so much...and that you usually pay not more than 900 or 1000...almost always they come back with "1000 ok"....as soon as they realise that this is not your first time riding a steer at the rodeo...they negotiate down...