Hello! I am a member of a brand new group that is bringing theater to our small community of 11,000 people. We are just starting out, but have been given a 1/4 acre of land and have built a temporary building with the approval of the city. We must have a permanent building within 2 years. I am new to all of this and I have been asked to head up our marketing and advertising. I was hoping you all could give me some of the ways you advertise. The cheaper the better, but any suggestions would be helpful.

Also any ideas you've used to fundraise would be great.

Thanks

I want to echo what Kathy said. You need a specific goal for your fundraising efforts. You need to do a conceptual design of the building you want to estimate costs and have something to show people as you are fundraising.

Our local theater got it backwards and hired an expensive consultant to figure out how much they could raise then came up with a set of plans to use that much money. Their expansion was to be in four parts - more offices, more back stage room, a new black box and an endowment (40% of funds raised) to pay the annual costs of the expansion.

The consultant came back with a figure of $3,500,000 that they could expect to raise. (The original building cost $1,000,000 fifteen years ago). Their fundraising stalled out at about $2,000,000.

A few observations: You will never raise $1,000,000 $25 at a time.

It takes a lot longer to raise money than you think it should. People want to think about their contribution and see some results. Most want to see some form of public support for the project - either through matching donations or giving the last dollar not the first.

The "big hitters" have personal philanthropic goals that probably do not include theater. You have to show them how the theater will help them accomplish their objectives.

Be subtle. Our local fundraising group approached people with the pledge amount already filled in!!! They handed me one with a figure several times what I could afford/was willing to give. Needless to say they got zero.

People like to see their names on stuff. Our library names rooms after the people who fund the furnishings. I used to live in a town where even the bar stools have names on them!!!

You need to have a track record. Those who can afford to make significant donations are inundated with requests. They want to give to a successful organization.

I sat on the Board of a non theater group that wanted to raise $1,000,000 for a building. We did it in 90 days, overshot our target by $100,000 and had more donors over $1,000 than under $100. We made up list after list of people to solicit and how we would approach them.

The greatest philanthropist in the area was on the board and he worked several of the big hitters and was very successful - he, with a lot of admin support, raised one third of the money himself. There is a big hitters network that the rest of us can't begin to understand. I think it is "you help with my project and I will help with yours".

We got the tax records for the area and targeted those with expensive homes and water front property. We looked at plaques in our other local buildings to see who gave. We looked at who sat on other non profit boards and so on - list after list after list. We had a member of the fundraising committee in charge of each list. We had several tailored messages explaining why we needed the building.

I think you are being really ambitious to go from start to a new building in two years but good luck. If you succeed I will be very jealous - we have been in business two years and are still looking for a permanent home - we have to move our shows every night!!!!

Good luck!!!!