Lyric opera house subscribtion how to#

That means we are always at the mercy of the marketplace. “But the shift to individual ticket buyers has been less than gradual, and while our sales are still quite good, the percentage of subscribers has dropped. “As Newman’s results diminished, we shifted to year-round telemarketing and social media as the foundation for subscription sales, and it managed to increase brochure sales,” says Joseph Henson, president of Theatrical Arts Foundation in San Bernardino, Calif. And while there are reports and statistics that make some numbers look better than others, and determining national trends and patterns seems to be more difficult than predicting the future from peering into a crystal ball, any practitioner will tell you that the growth of the Internet has changed how we consume information, and it is affecting how we buy theatre tickets. By 2011, Theatre Communications Group reported a drop of 18 percent in theatre subscriptions nationwide in the four years prior. But to paraphrase Mark Twain: News of theatre’s rebirth was greatly exaggerated.Īs early as the turn of this century, the growth began to shift.

It seemed as if Newman’s scheme, with its strong foundation in the usage of nonprofit bulk postal rates and the distribution of sales brochures, was going to forever silence the centuries-long cry that theatre was dying. Those “new experiences” were how a theatre could educate and enlighten their audiences.ĭuring the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s, theatres that implemented Newman’s techniques saw tremendous growth in their attendance. Each patron would buy a pass to all productions in a season under the premise that some productions were for them and others would be new experiences. And Newman’s argument-that the “saintly subscriber,” as opposed to the single-ticket buyer, provided greater artistic freedom-was not without merit. Any organization willing to follow his instructions to the letter, he believed, would see vast growth in their subscription base. Newman was a press agent of the old school promotion era, working at the Lyric Opera of Chicago for decades and eventually touring the world as a consultant for both the Ford Foundation and Theatre Communications Group. The tome had reached 10 editions and was used in 31 countries at the time of his death in 2007.

Newman opined that theatres should pitch to everyone, leaving no stone unturned, and focus on the subscription brochure.

Lyric opera house subscribtion how to#

The book, a marketing bible for how to effectively “sell” theatre, followed Newman’s decades-long strategy for filling theatre seats with subscribers. The world of theatre subscriptions changed forever in 1977, when Danny Newman’s Subscribe Now! was released.