Presenter: George Thorn

Audience behaviors have changed more in the past five to ten years than the last thirty to forty years.  It seems the only consistency in audience behavior is inconsistency.  Fewer people are buying subscriptions, single-ticket buyers are waiting until the last minute to buy, and then they pick and choose among many ways to spend their leisure time and dollars.  This workshop will examine the complex causes driving these changes.  It will offer concepts and tools for understanding audience behavior and relationships, including sales-based marketing and integrated relational approaches and will describe a framework for planning, setting priorities, and implementing strategies to grow your audiences in a highly competitive environment.

Presenter:George Thorn is the Co-Director of Arts Action Research, a national arts-consulting group.  As a consultant, he works in all aspects of organizational development as well as making presentations to conferences and workshops.  In parallel with his consulting activities, for eighteen years he directed the graduate program in Arts Administration at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.  He was the Associate Director of FEDAPT.  Prior to these activities, he was the Executive Vice-President of the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center.  George spent sixteen years in New York where he had a general management firm that managed Broadway, Off-Broadway, and touring companies.  He began his career as a stage manager of Broadway productions.

In 1996, he relocated to Portland, Oregon, to open the West Coast office of Arts Action Research.  In Portland, he has consulted with approximately one hundred arts and cultural organizations.  Other activities include the Regional Arts and Cultural Council’s Cultural Leadership Program, the NWBCA’s The Art of Leadership Program, and two Convenings for the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation in Seattle and Portland.

With Nello McDaniel, he has co-authored the following publications:

An Elegant Process: The Artistic Process/The Planning Process

Leading Arts Boards

Growing Audiences

Arts Planning: A Dynamic Balance

Towards a New Arts Order:  Process, Power, and Change

Workpapers II:  Arts Boards—Myths, Perspectives, and New Approaches

A Special Report/The Quiet Crisis n the Arts

Workpapers I:  Rethinking and Restructuring the Arts Organization

Challenge of Change

For accessibility information please contact: Tonisha Toler at 503-823-5866