Expected Attendance
Printed From: Community Theater Green Room
Category: Theater Administration
Forum Name: Running Your Theater
Forum Discription: General questions about how to make it work
URL: http://www.communitytheater.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=3064
Printed Date: 11/22/24 at 10:50pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 8.05 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: Expected Attendance
Posted By: landon2006
Subject: Expected Attendance
Date Posted: 3/20/08 at 3:42am
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Hi all, I was trying to put together a budget here for out upcoming productions of Annie, Babes in Toyland and The Secret Garden. However, since we have not mounted our first production yet, I'm unsure of what to count as an average audience size. Our venue seats 561 people, and is right in the middle of downtown. The surrounding area has population of over 155,000 in this county alone. We are also doing the following advertising:
Based on the info I have provided, is it possible for anyone to give me a general estimate of what average house will be? I have been figuring up as 50% house at each Matinee, and 80% house at our night shows. PS) Our Ticket prices are: Main Floor (301 Seats) - $32 Adults, $19 Child. Balcony (260 Seats) - $26 Adults, $14 Child. In our opinion, these are pretty good prices for Musical productions in our area. We wanted to keep rates as low as possible to ensure more people have the option of seeing a show. Thanks, |
Replies:
Posted By: jayzehr
Date Posted: 3/20/08 at 9:06am
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Hi Landon:
Did you check with the theater you're renting about what kind of audiences they usually draw? Is this the same community theater you were talking about on the "money talk" thread--the one you just started that doesn't have any money yet? If so, I'd hate to see you making budgets based on projected 80% houses if you're just starting out. Jay |
Posted By: John Luzaich
Date Posted: 3/20/08 at 10:46am
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It's really hard to predict audience size because we don't know your market. What I can tell you is what we've learned and our past experience.
Because you're new, you could have a lot of interest in people checking you out. You could have good attendance and a "honeymoon period" before attendance drops. You're a good sized organization and by looking at other posts, looks like you have a lot of things going for you in your favor.
I can tell you if you do lots of benchmarking, you'll find out that in many market areas, attendance is down overall. We budget for 60% attendance. We are located in the Midwest and have had terrible weather for four months. Our last show in February (Lend Me a Tenor) sold at 43% capacity because of weather. Our Holiday show (Inspecting Carol) sold at 54% capacity. However, we sold Neil Simon's Rumors at 74% and M*A*S*H at 93%. A Christmas Carol sold at 85% capacity and Forever Plaid sold at 91%. But, those are some success stories. Attendance actually dropped for us this season. We all know, there are so many factors involved in the bottom line and attendance.
I'd adjust your numbers down for projections. Of course, you're producing Annie, so in that case 80% might be right on. That almost always sells well anywhere. Having an e-mail list of 6,000 is huge! We only have 865 and it's taken awhile to build that up. But, I think that's the best thing you have going for you.
We just finished our budgeting process for our next fiscal year and budgeted very small increases in both season tickets and individual admission tickets. ------------- John cfct@cfu.net http://www.osterregent.org http://www.facebook.com/osterregent |
Posted By: landon2006
Date Posted: 3/20/08 at 4:19pm
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Thanks for the replies guys! The Theater we are renting is a 616 seat historic theater that has been in business for more than 80 years now. The usually have shows there every weekend and according to there website, its one of the busiest community Theater in the nation as fare as number of shows go (they have like 265 public shows a year). They actually have a pretty good deal going. They include all box office service (downtown box office, online and by phone) in the rental of the Theater as well as sending out press releases to regional news outlets and sending e-mails to their known ticket buyers. The daily rental is kind of steep though: $1,300! Check out there website: http://www.buskirkchumley.org/ - http://www.buskirkchumley.org/ We had figured it being pretty difficult to get a good estimate of numbers... I have a meeting with their Tech Director tomorrow... Maybe he can fill me in on their average show attendance. I'm hoping we at least make $7,000 off each performance, in order to fund the next show. One of the good things about this Theater is that since it has been there so long, it has loyal following of ticket buyers as well as the fact that it is right downtown on the courthouse square right at the edge of IU Campus. This was it draws both Community and College students & staff. ------------- |
Posted By: landon2006
Date Posted: 3/20/08 at 4:57pm
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Also, that 6,000 person mailing list is not ours. It's included in with rental of the Theater as is Box Office and front of house service. I'm sure it took them years to build that email list. Our town and surrounding county also has more than 150,000 people which might have helped too. ------------- |
Posted By: jayzehr
Date Posted: 3/21/08 at 7:05am
| Landon--Surfing around I noticed that IU did a production of Annie last fall with similar ticket pricing to what you are talking about. Maybe you could poke around to see if you can find out what size audiences they drew. You probably can't count on doing bigger numbers than what they did. |
Posted By: JoeMc
Date Posted: 3/21/08 at 9:48pm
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Some thing to think about?
May be something like 'Grease' or even 'Godspell' could be a better option.
I have found they both sell out before auditions are finalised. I have no idea why? Especialy 'Godspell'! ------------- [western] Gondawandaland "Hear the light & see the sound! TOI TOI CHOOKAS {may you always play to a full house!} |
Posted By: jayzehr
Date Posted: 3/22/08 at 1:32am
Yeah, no kids and no dog on stage 
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Posted By: landon2006
Date Posted: 3/23/08 at 4:39am
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Yes, the current US national tour of Annie came to Bloomington in October and played 2 dates at the IU Auditorium (3,150 seat Theater). The Tuesday night performance I seen was sold to at least 2,800 seats if not more. Don't know about Wednesday. Although, there ticket prices where different than mine. The minimum price was $37 for Balcony, up to $59 for Center Orchestra. I'm thinking along the lines of $32 for Main Floor and $26 for Balcony. Also, the Theater we play at is more "Community Oriented" than IU Auditorium. The Auditorium usually plays to about 60% IU Faculty and Staff, the Buskirk-Chumley (the one we use) almost always plays to community residents. Thats pretty much what we are going on is that: #1 people who could not afford to see the national tour might be able to afford this a little better and #2: Those people in the general community who are not familiar with IU Auditorium probably will have a better chance of coming since the Buskirk-Chumley is not located on IU Campus like the IU Auditorium. WHAT I AM CONCERNED ABOUT THOUGH: Is that it might be "too soon" to do another production of Annie, and expect it to sell. As it stands, it will be September before we actually put on the show, so it will have almost been 1 year since the national tour left... I'm sure there is people who would like to see it again, and of course though who would like to have seen the national tour but didn't have the money at the time, or time to go see it, etc. that may want to see it now. Any comments on this? Thanks. ------------- |
Posted By: spikesgirl
Date Posted: 3/30/08 at 11:29am
In our theater, we have a five/ten year rule, we try to avoid repeating any shows that has been done five years prior in the community or ten years prior in our own theater. This was enacted after we did back-to-back runs of ANNIE three seasons in a row. What a diaster that was! People can get tired of the show - we found that out in a very painful way. If possible, I would suggest you wait at least a season before you do ANNIE. There are tons of other shows that will pull an audience in and fresher/newer might be the ticket. Also, money is getting tight right now, so you might want to consider doing a two-fer show. We did that to fill our theater on Saturday nights (tradionally the worst night for us). Buy one, get one free. otherwise, we work a deal with a local restaurant to do a 20% off dining with theater ticket. That has also helped us out at times, especially with the drama. Charlie |