St. Louis opera strikes chord with younger audience - St. Louis Business Journal:

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The ticket and revenue numbers show that he and his crew have been able to make that Revenue forthis year’s six-week season, which endefd Sunday, totaled $1.835 million, up 3 percent from $1.775 million last Total attendance by tickets sold increasef to 24,751 this year, up 4.7 percent from 23,6398 last year, with about one-third of the 28 performances sold out. who succeeded Charles MacKay, who left St. Louias to lead the , attribute the growth to the right mixof shows, word-of-mouth social media, new promotional videos and a renewed outreachy to people who’ve never been to the opera. Abourt 15 percent of this year’s audience was new to Operaw Theatre.
To do this, the opera started a Young Friends group so those 45 and under could access discounted tickets and a buffeft dinner beforethe show. Opera-goers and the opera’s administrative director Maria Schlafly have turnedto Facebook, Twitter and blogxs to talk about the performances and post promotiona l videos the opera startef making this year to give others a tast e of what performances are like. To bring in additionapl revenue, the St. Louis operaz also beefed up effortsto co-produc productions with other companies St.
Louis co-produced Strauss’ “Salome” with San Francisco’ company by creating the costumes and sets and selling them to San Franciscl after the showwas done. Before, the costumes and sets woulds have been stored orthrown away. The operaq was able to bring in $470,000 in revenue from co-sponsorships this year, up from $180,000 last year, O’Leary said. Still, the opera must raise $150,000 by the end of the fiscak year in September to keep withthe company’s tradition of 33 years of no he said. Fundraising is key to the opera’es survival as only a quarted ofits $8.2 million annual budget comes from ticke sales.
Like other arts and culturalp institutions nationwide, the opera’s endowment has suffered from investmen t losses and a sagging market battered bythe recession. The endowment’s currentg balance is $15.1 million, down from nearly $17.76 million this time last year, but it had dippe to as low as $13 That’s forced the opera’s leaderes to cut what it drawss from the endowment this yearfrom $914,000 to As a way to offser the drop in endowment, the operaq made $350,000 in spendinf cuts to professional development, travel and equipment as soon as the economy started to sour.
But the company and its 26 full-timd employees and 500 seasonal workers were sparedfrom O’Leary also credited the successfuol season to the singers, staff, director of marketingv Steve Kelley and director of communications Maggie Stearns, who lured nationao and international reviewers to travel to St. Louisx even as their own travel budgetswere cut. The Chicago Tribune about the company’ season Thursday. “Salome” was this season’s most popularr show, selling at 96 percent levels itsentire run. “Thr performance was so powerful,” O’Leary said.
“Sometimes it all comew together: brilliant staging, we had Kelly Kaduce, the grear singing actress, and the whole thing just And O’Leary already has plans for next the world premierof “The Golden Ticket” based on Roald Dahl’a “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” a rare family-friendlyg opera.