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The Fight to Keep Audiences Engaged Until Theater Doors Reopen

The Fight to Keep Audiences Engaged Until Theater Doors Reopen

(Bloomberg Businessweek) -- The day New York’s Metropolitan Opera closed its doors, on March 12, it began to stream operas on its site for free. Since then about 250,000 people a day have visited. “Cumulatively, we’re at 262 million viewing minutes and 6.5 million unique viewers since we started a month ago,” says Peter Gelb, the general manager. “Extraordinarily impressive, considering it’s opera.”

Above the videos is a “Donate Now” button. Gelb says the Met has received more than $1 million in donations from “several thousand” viewers. And its database now has 120,000 new names. “We have not suffered a loss among any of our strata of donors,” he says. “If anything, it’s increased.”

And yet, places like the Met, which are dependent on live events, are suffering. Facing a $60 million loss after canceling its season, it furloughed most of its union employees and cut its senior staff’s pay; Gelb has waived his salary for the duration. As they struggle to survive, such companies are confronting their future: How do they ensure patrons are still there when they’re able to reopen?

“One of the real challenges for places that don’t have economic reserves to get through this period is how to sustain a core, so there’s some foundation with which they can rebound,” says Suzanne Hilser-Wiles, president of philanthropy management consultant Grenzebach Glier + Associates. Not only will patrons be disconnected from organizations they normally support, but many people will also see their portfolios plummet, hindering their ability to give at all.

On top of that, other appeals—­for health-care workers, food banks, social services—can feel more urgent than one to support a ballet company. “Cultural organizations have to show their relevance,” Hilser-Wiles says. And many “are doing a ­terrific job reminding people why they matter.”

Until it, too, shut down, the New York Philharmonic was on its way to a “gangbuster” year, says Deborah Borda, its president. Now it expects a $10 million loss. “The full picture of how audiences and human beings will interact is yet to be written,” she says. “Will people venture out and sit next to each other at concert halls before a vaccine is discovered?” What she does know, she continues, is that “the key to a sustainable future is interaction with our audiences.”

Within a week of closing, the orchestra introduced a portal called NY Phil Plays On that features past performances, educational content, and musician interviews. So far it’s working, especially among key small donors, who “are, without exception, ticket buyers,” Borda says. “We need them to come back.”

But groups without the resources of a Met or a New York Phil are in a very different position. “Not everybody is at that level of technological sophistication,” says Bruce Thibodeau, president of the Arts Consulting Group.

John Koegel, of the arts law practice Koegel Group, sits on the board of five small cultural programs including the Lower East Side Printshop and the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts. Although these tight organizations “don’t have to worry about furloughing 90 or 100 people,” he says, they also “don’t have the resources to crank up a digital program.” As a result, many such groups are in a bind. “If you’re not [visibly] doing anything,” he says, “it’s hard to say, ‘Give me money.’ ”

That’s certainly a concern for Peter Stathas. His eponymous eight-person dance company in New York gets 95% of its annual budget of about $100,000 from ticket sales. Without revenue he can’t pay his dancers; some have left the city. A digital strategy to engage patrons is, for the moment, nonexistent. “You can always use YouTube or Vimeo, but I don’t think it’s very satisfying. We’re used to performing live,” he says. “I was just saying to my wife, ‘What if this is the way it is now?’ ”

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