WHat the hell are you guys ordering that's running $800+?
To be fair, there are a couple of things that could cause that kind of price tag. The most common one is travel expenses. For example, let's say one of my customers wants me to hire Kelli Lynn Sage. I'm in California, Kelli Lynn is based out of Florida. Rule of thumb for customs is, the customer foots the entire bill. (heh. foot.) So you're looking at a bill for airfare and accommodations (hotel, AirBnB, whatever) which could run anywhere from $500 to like two grand before she's even on set. Then you have your typical model fees, which can be a hundred or three (or four, or more - I'll discuss that in a second), and of course, the producer doesn't work for free, so there's that markup as well.
I recently shot a $1200 custom for a fan feet-uring Katya. I saw almost none of that money, and Katya is local to me. Why did it cost so much? Because Katya is an internationally published fashion model and as nice as her hugs are, we're not such good friends that she's going to cut me a 90% discount for a shoot where she's going to be laughing herself to the point of blacking out (true story). So, the reasoning goes, if Katya can get $900 for a shoot where she has to put on a spangly dress and look pretty for a few hours (...and she can), she's going to expect
at least that much for a shoot where she's getting tortured.
For real, though, you're a fool if you're shelling out top dollar for a model whose work you haven't seen before and don't actually like. If you have, then it's sole-ly up to you whether or not you felt you got your money's worth. That customer who dropped $1200 on Katya's clip? He got the entire shoot (an hour's worth), all the behind the scenes stuff, an outfit of his choosing, including Katya's nail polish, and the specific type of tickling he wanted to see and he totally loved it. I'm not going to tell him he was wrong.
That said, Katya is an exception and most of my customs don't cost that much. Shop around for the best rates and do your homework before commissioning to see if what you're going to order is what you'll want to see.
Also? You (you, the viewer, watching the video) can't tell if they're faking unless they're literally reading off the cue cards during filming. Give it up.