Need a little more advice.  

I am new to the bowl, coming from the escort scene. Where I live there is a severe shortage of quality escorts and a local college with lots of coeds. If it wasn't for the shortage I'd stay with escorts. I’m 65 and married and chose not to lie about either but, for this area, have substantial assets, $5MM, and am willing to be generous. I am in shape and reasonably personable. I haven’t had a meet or greet yet, but have two scheduled and would like to increase my chances then showing up but more importantly getting them of the BCD.

Would sending the baby a small $25 or $50 gift before the meet and greet increase my chances of them showing up and also the chances of getting them BCD? I think I’m going to give a gift when they do show up, but I’m talking about before the visit. Also, if that helps, how best to do it. Do I ask for their email and tell them a gift is coming? Is there a way to send a gift through SA? How is the best way to send a gift through email?

I know, a lot of newbie questions but I very much appreciate the help.  

Rick

I can't imagine a girl who has doubts about BCD is going to forget them over $25.   $500, yes.

If you don't care about money, let her name her price, then agree.  If you do care then you're going to have to risk a few nos on the way to finding a compromise.

Again, if you don't care about money, go with the monthly stipend.  That's already their mindset, ppm is a twist many don't like (too much like hooking.)  And for goodness sake, don't pay the stipend in advance.  You'll likely never see her again.

It would be less tacky and still send the signal that you are willing to be generous but not necessarily an ATM. Ask her what kind of food/restaurants she would like.  

Ask her quietly about her expectations, and be prepared to suggest something if she doesn't say. Alternatively, you can ask if $xxx per dates or $xxx per month would be okay.

I have had a potential SB (18 y.o. college girl) ask for cash for a M&G date; it turned out to be pointless waste of money that only engendered a second request for lunch and cash for that date.

Ok, this is not Fight Club. But we do have rules and the first rule is NO SUGAR in advance ever.  
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Sending a gift in advance does not increase your chances of going BCD. Nor does it even guarantee she will show up for the M&G. It may even make her more likely to cancel for some "emergency", then agree to another M&G and ask for a new gift and cancel again. Then it's wash, rinse, repeat until you realize she's playing for a chump. You may not ever feel a sting from 3 gifts of $25 each, or even care. But the point is to incent optimal SB behavior, not piss away your abundant cash.  
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You can certainly give her an unannounced gift at the end of the M&G, say $20 for gas and parking,  or a $30 gift card to Starbucks. Some SD's here get good results with that and I have used it selectively when I thought it would help encourage a new POT SB who might back out due to nerves, shame, etc. If you have this in your pocket and she turns out to be a poor match, you just don't give it to her when you part.  
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If she is motivated to cultivate you (and probably others) as a "good" SD, she will understand that sugar requires sugar.  Once you have your M&G, you can move on to negotiate P4P or whatever to get to BCD. That could happen during the M&G and conclude with you doing the horizontal bop that night. Or you could wait to negotiate and schedule BCD in the near future. That's up to you, your personal "closing the deal" skills and style and her level of comfort vs her desperation for getting cash.  
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Bottom line: just like in civvie dating, she knows within the 1st 60 seconds of meeting you (or reading your profile) whether she will fuck you or not. Stay away from providing any sugar until she demonstrates her affirmative decision - usually by getting on her knees and showing you.  
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There is one more dynamic to this:  Don't screw up the local market for the rest of us by grossly over paying for BCD, let alone non-BCD sugar!

.. I generally offer the gift just as we're about to go BCD. After she agrees, before anything happens. That's worked well for me and I don't believe I've ever overpaid.

Giving them a gift during the M&G kills the market for the rest of us.   Golden rule of the bowl is no honey (sugar) no money.    
In the words of a great movie, “you’re killin’ Me smalls!”  For the love of your fellow mongers keep your wallet in your pocket until you get to taste the nectar.  Thank you!

I guarantee you, sending a gift first will either kill your chances or kill your wallet down the line. NEVER ado it.  

If you need to send her $500 to even meet you, I guarantee she is either going to ghost or try to keep it platonic because I am assuming she wasn’t attracted to you and didn’t want to fuck you anyways.  If she’s just there for the money, she’ll take off as soon as she gets it.  

I’ve had 3 girls not even mention money until AFTER the first bcd because they legitimately wanted to fuck me. Once, the money wasnt mentioned until a week later, at which point, I agreed to meet her to bring her money, no mention of sex. When I saw her, she was totally dolled up. I asked what she was doing later and she said, “you”.   At which point I quickly booked a hotel and fucked her again. Total cost, $240.  

There is a pair of professional daters in my area that ask for $200 before meet and greet. A friend of mine paid and got no second date or bcd.  

So don’t ever send money first. Besides ruining the market, there’s no real chance it’ll help you. If they didn’t like you enough to come to a meet and greet, there’s no chance you’re tapping that. And if she’s a pro, you might as well skip the meet and greet and just start negotiating.  

The only thing I might give a girl before sex but after a meet and greet is a gift card for Victoria’s Secret, and only when we’ve met and BCD is definitely a go.  I tell them to show me the panties they buy.

I've done it about a third of the time with perfect success, M&G => BCD.
However, it does require a lot of skill and intuition (and of course, luck!).  
Since I only "date" blonde girls, one lovely 19 y/o Hispanic girl and I agreed she should go from a blonde-ends only to a full blonde look, which is fairly expensive, so I gave her $500 and the following week she showed up early & blonde!
Last month it was Christmas, so on two occasions I sent $500 gifts and was more than amply rewarded.
Like I said, you can throw a bait-less hook in the water and see what low-end creature bites, or attach a sumptuous morsel and reel in a nice one, now and then.
Sorry guys for taking advantage of the market, but it's not like we are ever going to cross paths, with 12,000 SB in my area  - lol.   Plus, I've deactivated my SA account for now...
Would I recommend it for the average Joe?...No, because there are alot of rinsers out there just waiting for the opportunity to pounce.

You have two M&Gs scheduled, so you have the ball rolling and what happens next should tell you whether these girls are serious without additional enticements.  You sound like you have all the good intentions of being a steady, long-term SD, so...

If a girl doesn't show up for a scheduled M&G without a really good excuse, she's probably not what you want in a SB.

If a girl won't show up for a M&G without a gift in advance, as everyone else says this should raise major red flags about a scam or a SB who will constantly be looking for extra favors.

If you send unsolicited gifts in advance, then you're coming across as desparate or worse, planting the seed for expectations of extras that may not have even been there to start with.

Show up to the M&Gs.  Assuming they do too, be friendly, non-pushy, generous with whatever needs to be paid for during the M&G, and let them know you're interested in taking it further.  If the girls are serious about pursuing an arrangement and there was any chemistry at all, the rest of the negotiations get a lot easier after that kind of first encounter.

The only thing that might be worth doing is to have some sort of modest gift card as a back pocket option - if a M&G goes well and you want to signal that you're generous and serious then you could slip them this at the end as a 'more to come' gesture, and it could get the BCD scheduling kicked off quickly.  

Hopefully you're only a few steps away from some fun!

I agree.  
Being new to this my scam alert went up when a  POT demanded " gas money" be sent to a Ven Mo account in advance.  
I not only said NO I said HELL NO

First and foremost is ....THERE IS NO SURE WAY TO GET HER TO SHOW UP  !
But you might benefit from telling her now that you would like to show your good intentions by bringing a gift to give her when you meet...if she has a " gift list" on her profile you could ask which one she would prefer...if she has no gift list, just ask her if she would like a gift card or something specific from Victoria's Secrets etc. that she could model for you on a a date !
In addition, if she's truly interested in meeting you she will be responsive to regular communications, especially close to the scheduled date....when they go silent for loooong periods of time, it generally doesn't bode so well
Finally, the advice from our brothers here about NOT ADVANCING any money or gift is very wise 😋

BE PREPARED !
It's very possible that she'll be willing to go BCD on the first meet....so have a plan to get a hotel or whatever so you don't have to put her off and lose the chance to fuck her right then or even ever !
I've had a few M&G's that went fabulous ...all details were agreed to and we enjoyed some passionate kissing when I walked her to her car before parting and we both promised a next date BCD a few days in the future ...then later they either ghosted or came up with some reason that it wasn't going to work out.

My best SB dates involved going BCD immediately after the M&G. The very best (and loveliest and best in the room) involved meeting in the room to drop off our work stuff before going to the restaurant. We ended up getting intimate before the M&G, delayed the restaurant reservation by about an hour-and-a-half, and then going back to the room after dinner for more until I realized it was 2:00 am and my teenage son was texting to ask where I was. We were together for a long time, and it was great.

The one who wanted payment ($50 if I remember correctly) for a date at the time of the M&G, was a total teenage college-girl flake. I stupidly went along with the second date for lunch at a high-end place, including with the donation. Fortunately for me, being a 18-year-old flake, she was a no-show, so all I had to do was apologize to the restaurant and save some money on both the donation and the much larger cost of the restaurant bill.

If they want to go forward with it, they will let you know that it is okay with booking a room after an after-work M&G. This is mostly for the 23+ group. For these ladies, they want to see that you don't seem like a serial killer, don't look unreasonably unlike your pictures/profile,  or like someone who woke up in a dumpster that morning. If you surpass those low bars, they tend to be very accommodating.

....when I was transitioning into the Sugar Bowl from stricltly dating pro escorts, my assessment of what to offer and pay was skewed by my experience with escorts hourly rates...consequentially when first meeting a lady that I really wanted to get BCD I would offer or agree to a $$$$$ amount roughly equal to what a pro of the same physical beauty and caliber would command for her services. My largess with SB's resulted in a high ratio of first date BCF encounters. Some were VERY worthwhile and others not so much.
The lesson I learned from taking that approach is that I also had to BE PREPARED To occasionally be very disappointed in the overall connection/sexual encounter and consequently feel foolish and some remorse for my eagerness and overpayment.
There is no review board to assess the quality of service etc for SB's ...so unless you can find a couple of local SD mongers to exchange info about local SB's you have each met, you are in " no man's land" and all on your own.
Happy Hunting !

The bad girls out there will take you for a ride and ask for too much for offering too less cause offering sugar/gifts in advance will indicate that either you are too desperate or too rich to care. Trust me you don't want to be either.

And the good girls out there, who are over 8 on TER scale, would not like a guy who wants to show off his riches as these days girls want a mutually beneficial relationship that does not feel like being an escort. I have met many girls who told me during our first meeting that they had met a guy thru site who offered an envelop of cash after the first meal together saying that this is to show he is serious to have an arrangement with her but she did not like being offered cash this way as she felt guilty. I know you will laugh at how much of a hypocrite they are, but again trust me you are better off not giving any sugar until you have actually gotten some sugar first.

All the best!

I just got home from a M&G that started yesterday afternoon and would still be goin on if I didn't have business to attend today.

 
She was rather indecisive about meeting, so I just told her i was going to make up her mind for her and for her to text me her address and that I would be right over to get her. We had no set plans, no set allowance, and no actual plans to go BCD.  I told her I had ZERO preset expectations and our "date" could last as long or as short as she wanted. It was always a given that I was going to give her some "help", but we never spoke specifics until this morning after we had spent the night together and she started talking about being "unsure" about what we were doing. She also mentioned how many guys had offered her $500 up front, but were pretty specific about what they wanted. I filled in the blanks for her and said "They made you feel like a hooker, didn't they?" She immediately agreed and told me she never went out with any one of them for that reason. I told her I would most definintely help her out from time to time, but that I would NEVER treat her like a hooker.  I gave her a couple of hundred bucks and she was thrilled to death and wants to keep seeing me.

 
Sorry guys, but sometimes the "direct approach" is NOT the winning strategy with the non pros. I could have offered her over twice as much for a couple of hours, or I could simply "go with the flow" and end up with a non pro who is likely to never ask me for much more than a couple of hundred bucks by "listening" and not simply making an offer that no matter how generous is going to make a non hooker feel "cheap"  

 
I know some of the guys here from the hooker world want to cut the odds down to as close to a sure thing as they can get, and if you think blowing a hundred bucks on dinner/drinks with a woman that ends up not sleeping with you is a complete waste of money, then I suppose I can see why some of you guys like to negotiate BEFORE the actual date. But after reading countless posts by guys who approach this in both ways, I feel I can put my "first date batting average" up against any of the guys who negotiate an "allowance" in advance of the first date and still don't get any pussy until the second date or later. lol

END OF MESSAGE

I posted this where I asked a different thread where I asked about asking for pictures before the M&G to prevent catfishing.  

Finally had my first M&G with a girl that I thought about asking for pictures because she looked too good to be true. Took everyone's advice and focused on getting to the M&G. When she asked for money in the chatting I said sure "A bit when we meet, lots more when have an arrangement." She never asked for the money during lunch, I just think she wanted to make sure that I didn't have unreasonable expectations.  

She was a little late but seemed very interested so I stuck with it. My plan was to take her to lunch, give her a $50 gift card, then head off to my afternoon appointment.  

She was so young looking that I asked to see her ID; her driver's license said she just turned 19. Spinner with long blond hair. TER 8, but how I like 'em.  

Long story short, quick lunch to BCD. I'm now sure she's semi-pro, but that's not a problem for me. She says she likes longer stays and said no to little. I had to leave earlier than I wanted, I scheduled another meeting (business) soon after lunch, I was not thinking about getting BDC. I thought it would be a tough sell.  

So far, I'm one for one. I have two more M&G setup, I'm chatting with both online. One already has brought up when should we talk about 'expectations.' The other has mentioned that she visited a strip club last weekend and her profile says she is sex positive. I'm optimistic for both.  

It now appears that I will have more opportunity than time. Not all the women that I want to respond do. Different than the escort world, where the response rate, for me in my area, is very high. Also, I do take a pass on some women who message me, I'm just not that interested.  

Thanks for the help everyone. I will report on progress.  

I'm bit busy with a couple of real SB's so haven't had a chance to read this thread totally.
So, here's my scenario yesterday: taking Herb's advice, I'm preparing a backup SB...
I'm texting her, meanwhile I see she's been online on SA for the past couple of hours
She send's me another semi coherent message about  "when would my weekly payments start?"
So, to cut though the shit, I just say: "send me your Paypal"
Do a quick $500 transfer...
This afternoon we are in the sack.  Maybe a 8.5 on the TER scale, but super cute British accent.
OK, my bad, wouldn't get GaGa's seal of approval, but really tight, 21 y/o pussy!
Sorry guys for being a dick, but it works for me.
Quite open to be proven wrong...

PayPal transfers can go wrong in many ways  - for you and for her. And in general you risked losing the $500 with no recourse to get it back.  
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I won't restate all the reasons, you've read them many times.  
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Just promise to stay honest and tell us when the pay in advance method backfires as well, lease.