[If someone’s already doing this, stop me now; or, at least, post a comment and tell us all.]
Perhaps it’s just me, but everywhere I turn in this city there’s an all-you-can-eat special. I blame/credit The Recession/People Getting Fatter.
Would an all-you-can-see card work for concert presenters? I’m not sure how pricing for something like that could be figured out, but I do like the idea of paying for a card at the beginning of the season, getting week-of or day-of e mails when performances haven’t sold out, and then sitting in the available seats for…what would seem like “free!”, since I had already paid for the all-you-can-see card months ago. Perhaps I could add a ticket for a friend for $5 or $10 as well, like I do for MoMA admission with my membership.
When faced with a buffet situation, I find myself trying new things; sure, put it on the plate, if I don’t like it, it’s not like I ordered it for my whole meal. This is why an all-you-can-see card would work best at venues with diversified programming like (le) poisson rouge and Joe’s Pub. I might not buy a full-price ticket to see an artist I’m totally unfamiliar with, but I will go if I’m still available that night and can get into the concert with my card. Sure, put it on the plate!
I fully admit this idea is full of holes, but nobody likes empty seats, and having a group of people who have invested some funds in your organization and who you can get in touch with week-of/day-of just might be a better solution than papering the house.
I don’t know of a program that quite works this way, but it’s a great idea. Washington National Opera does a version of this with its Generation O program for people 35 and under. The program is free to join, and members receive deeply discounted ticket offers for upcoming performances. When available, the company offers Gen-O members premium seats, sometimes as low as $25 (an incredible deal for opera). There company also offers Gen-O members permanent subscriptions at the start of the season, and those are deeply discounted too–those sell out within a week. Overall, the flexibility combined with the discounts has made this an incredibly successful program, with more than 10,000 members in just 5 years. It’s one of the best arts deals in the District.
I believe Philadelphia Orchestra does something similar to what you describe with its new EzSeat program…I hear it’s been a hot topic at League meetings. You buy a $50 or $75 membership at the start of the season, but don’t choose programs or seats. Instead, you buy tickets throughout the season, but they’re discounted…so like a subscription, you get access to good seats for less than buying a single ticket. But you’re not locked into dates.
Your All-You-Can-Eat idea is one that might also work well with multiple arts presenters, in small-to-medium sized cities. Get a card, and sample dance one night, theater the next, etc. I wonder if there would be a way to implement these programs without losing money?
Hm, this is the closest thing I could think of:
http://performances.org/education/culturecard.html
Open only to UCSF and SF Conservatory students and post docs, for $25, you can attend up to 20 concerts, for free, from their list of performances.
This sounds like a flexi-subscription only much more fun and easier on the pocket book. Plus there is no anxiety about having to plan 6-8 months in advance.
The Tsoundcheck program at the Toronto Symphony has aspects of your idea. The program is $12 tickets for 29s and under. Tickets are available for all concerts but when one is undersold, I get an email the day before encouraging me to come. I can bring a friend of any age for another $12.
My local chamber music society does a 6-pack ticket where you get a card with 24 stars on it. When you attend a concert, 4,6 or 8 stars are ticked off depending on the price of the ticket. $120 worth of concerts can be had for $90. Since you are essentially buying credits, if you bring a guest, the price of their ticket is simply subtracted from your 6 pack-card.
They also offer a Superticket which is good for all the concerts throughout the season. If you attended every one, it works out to less than $5 per concert.
McCarter Theatre has two different ‘flex plans.’ They’ve got one that lets you select from three of the produced theatre shows and two presented events for one price ( https://ticketing.mccarter.org/ticketing/subscriptions/cyo321.aspx ) and another that lets you buy four seats for the whole theatre season, and use them as you like (either 1 seat for 4 shows or 4 seats for 1 show – https://ticketing.mccarter.org/ticketing/subscriptions/choicepass.aspx ).
As luck would have it, we have been discussing arts pricing and buffets in class, so here’s my two cents…
Your problem is that you don’t want to go broke by offering this deal and having everybody buy it instead of ordinary ticket sales. With pricing the key is to offer what looks like a good deal to the marginal customer – the one who is not-quite certain whether to buy or not – while keeping a higher effective price for those customers who you know are quite keen on what you offer.
All-you-can-eat buffets work on the principle that the typical customer is not going to eat all that much anyway, so it doesn’t cost you much to offer them as many plates as they like. But the marginal customer is one who is very hungry, and might not be willing to pay full price for just one plate, but will be attracted with the free refills. So, the marginal customer effectively gets a lower price per plate, a quantity discount, and it makes sense to offer this when the quantity discount matters a lot to him.
But not all restaurants are buffets. Why do other restaurants offer moderately-priced main courses but high mark-ups on extras like wine? Because in that case the situation is reversed. The marginal customer is one just looking for a reasonably-priced place to eat, and simply won’t bother with the wine, while the average customer will purchase a bottle. Use the low price for entrees to attract the marginal customer, and make your money on the typical person who buys wine (note the same situation applies to the often-noted phenomenon of cheap movie tickets and expensive popcorn…).
So, to get back to Life’s a Pitch…offer an all-you-can-see sort of ticket if you think your marginal customer is someone who, if she bought a ticket at all, would go to a lot of shows, while your typical customer, even if they had such a ticket, wouldn’t attend so often anyway.
And don’t make this offer if your marginal customer is someone probably just interested in attending once or twice, but your average customer would attend a lot under an all-you-can-see deal…you’ll go broke.
We offer something similar to college students at the beginning of the season when they’re back from summer break. They buy a $25 College Card and can attend any concert or open rehearsal throughout the season at no additional charge. We spend very little staff time on this, but always get several students who take advantage of the offer. We encourage them to call the theater the day of a concert to make sure tickets are still available, then all they have to do when they arrive is show their College Card and a valid student ID and we give them the best ticket available at that time.
Dallas Symphony has something a little like this, but you’re charged a monthly fee for the privilege. It always seemed pretty cool, but I also know that it’s buried on their site.
It seems almost like a Netflix style rather than an “all you can eat” style.
http://www.dallassymphony.com/Special_Offers.aspx
I really appreciate MR’s analysis here, and I think he raises a lot of good points. Personally, I’m inclined to think that “all you can hear” passes might work if they’re structured carefully and combine some of the great ideas that were tossed out here.
(1) Make them available only to a carefully defined audience that you want to court and for whom price and planning are significant barriers (likely young people)
(2) Make the passes valid only when you have excess inventory (aka seats to fill) that you’re unlikely to sell at a higher price point, probably only on the night of the performance; pass-holders therefore have to assume some risk (they might not get in to a given concert) to reap the potential reward of cheap seats
With these two ideas combined, you’re going to have an offer that’s unappealing and/or unavailable to your hard-core subscribers, so you won’t cannibalize your audience. This could be perfect, though, for a presenting series on a college campus, like where I work. We often have a number of empty seats because of subscribers who don’t show up. If we could give them an incentive to tell us in advance that they aren’t using their seats on a given night (maybe a tax write-off? or simply an appeal to their goodwill) we could fill those good, unused seats with “all you can hear” pass holders, without losing revenue. It’s essentially rush by another name, but I think the advantage is that, hopefully, you build a relationship with the audience over time since they’re part of a “club”
I have personal experience from both sides of the fence with the Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota FL.
Several years ago as a patron, I bought the $99.00 seasonal theatre pass, which allowed me to come to any performance and get a seat, pending availability. If a particular production/performance was a sell-out hit, no ticket. It was a great deal and I am an avid theatre person. But I found that, although I’d made the investment and even lived close to the theatre, I didn’t go often. So I like the idea of an e-mail reminder/notification that tickets are likely to be available. I would probably have made better use of the pass with a little bit of nudging.
A year or two later, I filled in as night manager at the same theatre. We had a dedicated window for theatre pass patrons, and they lined up for seats–not only because they wanted to get their money’s worth but because if there was a show they really liked they could come back again and again to see it.
The biggest issue/boondoggle (which we also find at Sarasota Opera, with our Friends and Family Pass) is overcoming the sense of entitlement. The pass does not entitle you to choose your seats–you get what we want to give you…hence the price break.
Speed is also of the essence. If you do not allow enough time night of performance for patrons to take advantage of the pass, then your box office will be swamped at five minutes to curtain and you’ll be hard pressed to get everyone in.
It’s also important to message that they may not get in and should always have alternate plans in place as a fun back-up.