Cardi B revealed she made $12,000 in one night stripping in Dallas before launching her rap career. Now she is preparing for her tour.
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Cardi B has never been shy about her past as a stripper. The Bronx rapper has built his career on honesty, and that unfiltered energy came through during a recent livestream.
The “WAP” artist dropped a bombshell about her dance career. She told fans she made $12,000 in one night stripping in Dallas.
“I remember when I was stripping down, Dallas was different,” Cardi B said on the livestream. “They booked me there and I made about $12,000 in one night. Seriously. That was good money. Real good money.”
Cardi B began stripping at age 19 after being fired from an Amish supermarket in New York. She worked in clubs like the New York Dolls to escape poverty and abusive relationships. This decision completely changed her life.
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“Striping saved my life,” she has said before. The job made her financially independent and helped her escape a bad situation at home. She used the money to attend community college, then eventually dropped out to focus on dancing full-time.
The Grammy winner works at Club Lust in New York, where she pays $80 to $100 a night to stay. She turned those club experiences into social media gold. In 2013, her funny videos about life in a strip club went viral on Vine and Instagram.
These viral moments landed her a spot on Love & Hip Hop: New York in 2015. The cast doubted her musical talent, but Cardi B knew she had something special. She left the show after two seasons to pursue her rap dream.
But she still uses strip clubs as a testing ground for her music. Seeing the dancers perform “Bodak Yellow,” she was sure the song would be a hit.
Cardi has always defended her striptease background against critics, refusing to let anyone shame her for doing what she needed to survive. The rapper credits her mother with helping her get out of dancing. When her mother found out what she was doing, she was upset.
This disappointment prompted Cardi B to look for another path forward.
Those nights in Dallas are long gone now. Cardi has sold millions of records and won a Grammy Award for Best Rap Album. Her debut album, Invasion of Privacy, made history as the first female rap album to achieve platinum sales for every song.
She is preparing for the Little Miss Theater Tour starting in February 2026.
The 35-date arena tour will support her second album Am I Drama? ” Drops in September 2025.
