Greetings and salutations from Elko, Nevada's community theater, the Silver Stage Players. Herr Chairman here to ask a very simple question and hopefully garner a little insight into other companys. My question is; "In regards to the calendar, what defines your season?" Our company is thinking of aligning our theater season with the calendar year. Traditionally we have gone from Fall to the Summer to define our season but I am curious to see how other companies define their season and see if there are an opinions on our proposal to realign our season with the calendar year. We would greatly appreciate your feedback.

Our theater runs Aug to May for our mainstage season

 With the season calender most groups here run January to December.
But the do the fiscal year for their accounting  books & annual elections.

The season for my children's theatre runs the same as the school year ... August to March (we stop before planting season for all the country kids who help on the farms).  Starting next summer we're planning on adding a summer workshop.

As you can see from these posts and from what I've seen around the country, there seems to be a tendency to run a season from September to May or June, leaving summer either time off or for special summer programs, but that's not universal.  For much older theatres, way back when, it made sense to avoid summers -- no air conditioning!  It was also a time when participants, as well as audiences, did a lot of vacationing, etc.  Of course, I know one theatre that had no heat until a couple of years ago, so they ran from April or May through October or so! 

I think seasons are determined first by tradition (i.e., the way it's always been); by administrative needs (for example, corresponding to a funding cycle from a state or local arts agency) and/or by the audience being served (e.g., a tourism location might correspond to the tourist season).  

I wonder why your theatre is considering a change?  I ask because so often, organizations make changes for the sake of change rather than to address some strategic need. 

It may be helpful to look at such a consideration from a marketing point of view.  Personally, I couldn't recommend such a change if it's to address some internal administrative need.  I think your audience and your participants have to come first.  If a change will better suit them, then by all means, it makes sense.  Or will the change just confuse them?  There's danger in confusion.  When the market becomes confused, they tend to say "no".  That may not have a significant impact on single ticket sales, but could have a critical impact on subscriptions. 

There are just some things that it doesn't much matter what the rest of the country is doing.  What matters is what's going to work best for the needs of your constituency.