Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: When City Theatre subscribers arrive at their seats for the current show, they'll find a renewal form for the 2012-13 season with a special offer taped to their seat backs. Those who renew their subscriptions, and non-subscribers who sign up while at the theater, will go home with a bottle of wine. They also will have their names included in a drawing for a $500 Nordstrom gift card. "We want to make renewing and subscribing an event ... something fun to do, and you get to drive home with something in your hand," says Emily Price, City Theatre's director of marketing.
Sunday, April 01, 2012
Theater companies sweeten subscription deals
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: When City Theatre subscribers arrive at their seats for the current show, they'll find a renewal form for the 2012-13 season with a special offer taped to their seat backs. Those who renew their subscriptions, and non-subscribers who sign up while at the theater, will go home with a bottle of wine. They also will have their names included in a drawing for a $500 Nordstrom gift card. "We want to make renewing and subscribing an event ... something fun to do, and you get to drive home with something in your hand," says Emily Price, City Theatre's director of marketing.
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6 comments:
I really feel for LORT theaters in this economy. Getting people to buy tickets has to be harder than pulling teeth, especially with the increasing costs of production. I worked as a Guthrie ticket seller and it was hard to get people to buy season tickets THEN. And those were 1999 dollars. I could never imagine myself being in a place where I could be a season ticket patron; there is just too much flexibility in my schedule and the type of show they are producing. I know that in the past, theatre’s bread and butter were the season ticket holders, but I’m afraid they will need to adapt and a Nordstrom gift card may not be the answer.
While all of the incentives listed in the article seem like good ideas, and it's certainly great that theaters are coming up with more and more incentives to target different audiences to purchase tickets, it seems to me that all of the results would be rather minimal. Yes, every little bit counts and helps, but I think this may not be the most effective approach. The question is really what can the theater do to make their season more attractive to the public? How can the shows be marketed differently? Are there community outreach events that can pull customers in? I think the questions are bigger than quick sweet deals like free parking on one day, as nice as that seems.
I'm not sure how effective these are, but they seem like good ideas. I especially like the bottle of wine. It's tangible, and immediate. Sometimes it seems like every time we do anything, we get entered into a drawing to win something. That's not really an incentive for me, and probably isn't for other people as well.
Setting up in the lobby seems to be effective in general. My community theatre always sold the most desserts and such after the show, when people are mingling and chatting, and sticking around for a little bit.
I am glad that theatres are finding new ways to get subscribers because it is important for them to find new ways to bring people into the theatre. In this economy theatres are struggling and are having a hard time making money. The suggestions that are given in the article sound like reasonable ideas but I am not so sure about how useful they will be. Although the Pittsburgh public theatre has seen 50-percent conversion then they must be working in some way. I think that the best idea is creating an event in the lobby after the show.
I'm pretty surprised that this works. If I were to get a subscription to any theater it would be because I want to see the shows in the season and not because I could potentially get a 500 dollar gift card to Northstroms. But then again I'm not exactly the audience member they are looking to market to. And while perks do sweeten the deal I don't think that people are going to buy subscriptions because there is a bottle of wine included. It might mean that they will sign up for the subscription in the theater which guarantees that they have bought it, but those kinds of people are already sold and have enough money to not think over that type of purchase would probably become subscribers anyways.
I am glad to read an article about a solution to financial crises rather than complaints. This is an organization that is thinking practically about how to get people in their seats. In my opinion, some people may view this apporach as immature or childish - but it works. Who cares if they are increasing ticket sales. The reason I say this is because really - everyone complains that they cannot produce better shows without more money - so this is the first step to fixing that problem: getting more money. Props to City Theatre and their initiative to produce results rather than complaints - go you.
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