Disneyfication

Correction: You girls ran around autograph hunting with genuine autograph books, the real McCoy. Favorite autographs? Chip and Dale, by a Disneyworld mile!

Elizabeth raises a great point about the importance of a sponsor, an overall marketing plan and solid PR to support merchandising. I've been at 3 different arts orgs now that have SO many branded tchotchkes (some awesome, some lame) left over from various campaigns. Literally thousands of stickers, posters, novelty glasses, t-shirts etc that patrons didn't buy, either because they weren't interested or because they weren't properly marketed. Waste of money, waste of storage space.

At one org, we scaled back on merchandising for logistical reasons and because it seemed not enough patrons were interested. Right or wrong, the judgment was made that selling posters, keychains, etc. wasn't worth the effort. And you know what happened? Patrons started saying "what happened to the xyz that I used to be able to buy?" A couple different times, patrons desperately wanted to purchase the advertising posters that were hung in the performing arts center....and then the posters ended up being stolen! Cracks me up....

So I do think there's potential demand, it just has to be stoked regularly to make it worth while. At the end of the day, needs to make good business sense.

Great ideas. As a publicist myself who works with alot of arts orgs, corporations, and record companies, I have found you need a big overall sponsor to make these marketing ideas work, as well as a central marketing strategy. It can be a very expensive undertaking for an individual artist or arts organization and efforts have tended to fail from lack of PR, lack of marketing, disjointed approaches, or lack of interest by the consumer.
In the past, record companies actually have tried some ideas like this but they were more difficult to get off the ground because of all the logisitics of each artist's needs, the cost of production, and performing arts organizations (typically orchestras) seeing the record company as a for profit and so therefore wanting some donation to participate, etc.

Well, opera companies and orchestras DO do this - many of them have shops or tables in the lobby selling T-shirts and umbrellas and fleeces with their logo, as well as non-branded items like books, CDs, jewelry.

I still use a keychain in the form of a brass ticket that I got at the Santa Fe Opera in 1983, after my freshman year in college.

Sure, but you don't often see classical musicians bringing their own merchandise on tour like bands do, which I think would enhance the concert-going experience as well. -AA

How about a passport for entire symphonies? Entire ballet companies? It might be a great way to begin to communicate with the audience and to inspire a generation of kids to the arts, with the added benefit of a bunch of signatures being available in one place.

The idea of bobbleheads was brought up on another blog as a way to show that people in classical music/theater can have a sense of humor: http://blogs.wnyc.org/culture/2008/06/20/i-went-to-the-theater-and-all-i-got-was-this-lousy-bobblehead-doll/

I think merchandise being sold at any show can help enhance the theatre going experience and allows that person to have a fond memory of that show. I have a Wicked poster hanging in my room (so cliche, I know), but I really did enjoy that show and it is one of my favorites. If a child has a t-shirt or an umbrella from that show, they can remember when they saw that Broadway musical. It gives them something to remember for a lifetime.

And the recently completed Passport to the Arts run by The New Yorker and benefitting Friends of the High Line does the same thing for art galleries! It's pretty awesome.

http://www.passporttotheartsnyc.com/