Airfare and arts: What are you paying for?

I travel around a bit, so I'm on the constant search for cheap flights. I flew over the weekend to Omaha to be with my family for Christmas. I went Southwest, one of my favorites, due to their low and predictable prices. Spirit is also incredibly cheap, offering fares often under $50. Explaining my flight options to my family, someone said, "how can some airlines offer fares so cheap, when others are so expensive?"

I thought for a moment, and knew the answer. Fares are cheap when there is less variety or choice in where and when you fly. You can only fly to a limited number of cities, and/or fly on very specific days. They keep prices low because they ONLY offer what is most cost-efficient for their company to produce, which may mean flights close to their headquarters, or flights between popular cities.

This reminded me of Rushton's explanation about the cost of books (the literary art form). Why are books cheaper in grocery stores or big-lots stores than they are in bookstores? Because the grocery stores only offers the absolute best sellers, a small variety, only what they know will sell and cover its own cost (John Grisham, Mary Higgins Clark, etc). Bookstores, whether small/independent or Barnes & Noble, offer more variety, so prices are higher to cover the cost of stocking lesser-bought books like poetry (they're a bookstore; it's their job to have variety, but they still have to pay for it somehow).

This also applies to performing arts, as explained by Doug Booher. Shows can be more expensive at performing arts centers that have more variety, because the blockbuster shows are underwriting the more experimental shows that don't cover their costs. The same with museums - they bring in the blockbuster special exhibitions that will bring in enough admission fees/sponsorships to cover other smaller or lesser-known but equally artistically important endeavors.

The arts are considered a “mixed commodity” because they are in part a private good – they can be sold to an individual purchaser and their benefits are enjoyed specifically by him (the ticket to a concert, for example). They are also in part a public good, because their presence enriches society as a whole (preservation of collective cultural heritage, prestige and identity conferred upon a body of people, developing aesthetic public tastes, etc, suggested by economists Baumol and Bowen). I might argue many other services are like this that we don't realize; enriching society in the form of options from which we may not individually benefit, but rather benefit indirectly, collectively, simply from their presence. (Example: Do we perceive our country to be more free, mobile, and well-off, if we have seemingly infinite commercial flight options, even if we ourselves do not take advantage of them? And are we as a whole benefited by this mindset? Do we take pride and comfort in knowing we COULD go somewhere if we need or want to, or that our children will have the opportunity to take advantage of these options in the future, contributing to more peace of mind? It may not be tangible, exactly, but the spillover externalities could be far-reaching.)

Point is, in many situations, when you're wondering about the price of something, consider if you're paying ONLY for what you yourself get (private good), or if you're paying for the options you have, or for the availability of lesser-popular offerings, the mere presence of which, it might be argued, enrich society as a whole.

Mary & Max

Mary & Max is our opening film at Sundance on January 15; it's an animated claymation film for adults about a reclusive middle-aged man in New York and his penpal, a little girl in Australia.

A couple interesting things here:

First, the filmmakers used Skype to collaborate on the film, over the course of 13 months. This is an example of technology advancement enabling the arts, rather than providing competition, as we often think of it.

Second, the style of photographer Diane Arbus inspired the visual thematics; evidence intellectual property law shouldn't be too strict, because good new art comes from old art, and makes the world better (uses old ideas in new ways, connects ideas, etc.)

read it all here:
http://festival.sundance.org/2009/news/article/the_odd_couple/

first week at Sundance

My arts admin classmates and I have started a blog to keep in touch, and so it is there that I wrote the update of my first week at Sundance. You can read it here.


I will add this here:
On my first day, orientation was supposed to start at 9 AM, and we were pushed back an hour, while the big wigs had a emergency budget meeting. I heard later the result of this meeting was a 20% budget cut. The festival usually runs on about $10 million a year. They just cut it to $8 million (4 weeks before the festival); not because they don't HAVE the money, but because they're conservatively trying to SAVE the money, as the future is uncertain with the economy.
It was also noted that, on the other hand, they feel an obligation to spend it, because that's why donors give it - they want to see their money go toward the mission of the organization, not sit in a bank account somewhere. This year, however, safety wins.

Commiskey Communication

Today, I'm proud of my friend, Patrick, who just launched his own marketing firm in Salt Lake City. Undoubtedly, he embodies the entrepreneurial spirit. His ambition speaks well to our generation of innovative, creative thinkers, who want control over our careers and ownership over our work (Martin's RenGen).

This is the grass roots heart of newer-wave theories on economic development - the development of small, local, dynamic firms, rather than the attraction of big firms. They create new jobs with better results, which is exactly what Commiskey plans to do. He told me he has plans to share his work load with other young and talented designers and marketers who are out of work. Further, he anticipates his clientele may be smaller businesses or non-profit organizations that need marketing or design services, that can't afford bigger, more established firms in the area. By being able to afford Commiskey, these local organizations get a boost to develop as stronger competitors in their markets, too.

I am so excited to see his agency develop.

Fado

They say you learn something new every day. Today, it was a little more about Bobby Jindal, and about Fado. For the sake of art, we'll stick to the latter for now.

I was researching the current season of Purdue Convocations, on the campus of Purdue University, presenting music, theater, and dance, and discovered a Fado concert. "What is this?" I thought, and quickly googled. A whole new (but old) type of music revealed itself...

From World Music Central and Purdue Convocations:

Fado music is the heart of the Portuguese soul. It is arguably the oldest urban folk music in the world. Like American blues, traditional Fado features sultry, sorrowful songs mourning lost love or working-class struggles. It’s a sad music and a fado performance is not considered successful if an audience is not moved to tears. It was played for pleasure but also to relieve the pain of life. Skilled singers known as fadistas performed at the end of the day and long into the night. Fado was traditionally the earthy music of taverns and brothels and street corners in Alfama and Mouraria, the old poor sections of Lisbon. Fado has now moved from Lisbon street corners and taverns into European concert halls...and is now making waves in the US. Dressed in black with a shawl draped over her shoulders, a fadista stands in front of the musicians and communicates through gesture and facial expressions. The hands move, the body is stationary. When it’s done correctly, it’s a solemn and majestic performance.

Mariza is the artist singing at Purdue. It's worth a listen.

Competition drives innovation

I arrived back in Indiana today via the new airport. I followed the signs to the ground transportation area, also new. I found the trusty old Bloomington Shuttle Service, with the little machine that spits out ticket cards for $25. And surprisingly, next to the kiosk with the familiar logo was a second kiosk with a big new sign that read "Bloomington EXPRESS Shuttle Service," and "Only $15."

Competition.

Hmm... I had to talk to someone about this. What was going on here? Was there a difference between the services? How was the new service suddenly able to so drastically lower the price? Did they have a competitive advantage that made their costs lower? Or had the original shuttle company been making huge marginal profits, and the new company was willing to reduce marginal profit, in favor of volume of sales? Did the second service evaluate the market and decide there was a big share to be had? In what way was the current service not meeting demand? (It seems there is always enough space on the busses.) And what will be the result: Will students gravitate to the new service because it's cheaper, or stay with the old one, because it's familiar and dependable?

The guy at the Express kiosk, of whom I began to ask these questions, was not very helpful. But I gambled on the new one, and got the exact same service, for a lower price. The bus was the same, the stops were even exactly the same. The driver did have to ask the ticket guy how to collect money from passengers with credit cards - he didn't know you can only buy tickets inside, before you get on the bus; so clearly they're still learning the system. They're copying the old service exactly right now.

Competition, but no innovation.

I was interested enough I found their website. It does say they're committed to improving the service, not making it identical to the old one. Their website says "After our trial run [of Thanksgiving weekend] we are working to make it bigger and better," and they welcome your ideas.

So competition drives innovation.

And funny enough, the old shuttle service website says "Bigger is not better when it comes to personalized service..."

So maybe it's a positioning issue, in the 4 P's marketing mix, on a quadrant grid. One will position as low-cost, basic service, the other will position as higher-cost, more personal service. Or maybe you can't really differentiate levels of service on such a straightforward product. So the original will just have to lower prices in order to compete.

The inversion is also true: Innovation drives competition.

I thought about this during the hour-long shuttle ride, before I opened my laptop and watched online episodes of Seinfeld; but that's a topic for a different post.

Next time you're standing at the kiosks thinking, $25 known, $15 unknown, know that they're exactly the same, pre-innovation, anyway.

Witch hunt

Thanks to Scott for pointing me toward this article. I've been up on the Prop 8 news, but this adds a new layer of complexity.

Since Prop 8 passed in California, denying gay people the right to marry, activists and gay rights advocacy groups have been making noise across the country. We even had a protest here in Bloomington. In particular, high-profile individuals that made donations to the Mormon church's heavy-handed effort to pass the proposal, have come under attack. (I blogged about this before, in regards to Sundance. But this post addresses a different issue.)

Notably, the director of the LA Film Festival, Richard Raddon, stepped down from the position he has held for eight years, after his donation was made public. Similarly, Scott Eckern stepped down from his position as artistic director of California Musical Theatre in Sacramento, after a protest in reaction to his donation that came to light. Admittedly, it seems counter-intuitive: a guy running a film festival in LA or a musical theater company in Sac could support a cause against gay rights? Raddon claimed a vague separation of his social beliefs and his religious obligation, if that explains it. Regardless. What seems more counter-intuitive, and to me is really the issue at stake, is that leaders in the arts community can be forced out of their jobs for holding unpopular beliefs. These are people whose career objective is to support and bring exposure to minority voices and contrary, often counter-culture, ideas, through film, music, and theater. If their organizations are anything like most non-profit arts orgs, these directors work every day to make the world a safer place for alternative-thinking art and people. And in this case, they themselves held the unpopular viewpoint, and expressed it monetarily. And now they're being persecuted by those who generally benefit from the work of their organizations. Ironic, right? (It should be noted the Board supported Raddon, citing his commitment to equality and diversity as a director, and were unwilling to fire him for his personal/religious activities. Well done. He stepped down, it seems, based on public pressure.)

It's hypocritical - these activists believe in rights for all, but then insist those who hold different opinions not be able to express their rights (in this case with a donation). You can't protest for equal rights, and then deny them to those who disagree with you.

The way I understand it, we are all constitutionally guaranteed equal rights, and if some are denied the right to marry when others are not, their rights are being violated. BUT we can't force people out of a job for disagreeing based on their religious affiliations. That's discrimination, and violating their rights.

If you support equal rights, practice what you preach: leave the individuals alone who don't support them. They're entitled to an opinion, same as you, without jeopardizing their professional careers. Quit the witch hunt, and instead of targeting individuals, protest the proposition or the institutions that supported it. If anything, protest to revoke the Mormon church's non-profit status due to their teetering political activity incompliance.

More on Patricia Martin's RenGen, and the careers of artists

Patricia Martin also notes in her interview that the Renaissance Generation, regarding their involvement in art and creative work, "doesn’t have the same negative notions about commercial work.... Rather than waiting 30 years to see if the Museum of Modern Art finds their work worthy, they will shoot a 30-second spot for DDB Needham [a highly-ranked advertising agency]....They are also incredibly savvy about when they are being marketed to, so you cannot lie to them." They're market-savvy and artistic, and so likely have a knack for creating advertising that is more honest and interesting. This means artists can find steady company work that is also somewhat artistically fulfilling. I think you see ads that have more artistically advanced cinemotography and concepts all the time; artists undoubtedly have value in the commercial world. (Examples: AmEx, Cadillac)

Strategy-wise, the advertising industry has recently engaged in a blurring of the line between advertisement and entertainment. As I first learned in a marketing class back in undergrad, advertising is becoming so easy for consumers to bypass, traditional ads don't work anymore. One tactic to solve this is product placement. Another is to make ads that become a form of entertainment in themselves. I think good examples of this are recent commercials featuring new musicians/songs (Hilton features Brett Dennen, Old Navy features Ingrid Michaelson, Jeep features Steve Poltz.) Other companies generate web content so good that the consumer is driven to seek out the ad, often sharing it with friends (example: Axe Body Spray). Who is contributing to these ads? Artists, whether hopeful filmmakers, musicians, or script writers.

Artists not opposed to commercial employment can find a home in this line of work, as Martin suggests they would be good at, and as the market now demands more creative advertising.

Martin goes on to observe, however, that "Unlike their parents, who would have stayed at the [advertising] agency, [young artists] will use that money to fund their independent documentary." It's a good market match: artists need jobs to make money to finance future independent work, and advertising companies need creative workers (and probably don't mind high turnover for fresh ideas). And that takes us back to the role of entrepreneurship. If they navigate ways to financially achieve their own work earlier in their careers, we may see artists finding success and being recognized for their own work at a younger age. The change in technology, affecting our attention spans, and thus advertising strategies, may have further-reaching effects on artists' careers than we realize.

Social Entrepreneurship

Ever since we sat in on the first couple weeks of a SPEA course called "Social Entrepreneurship," Stephanie and I have been on the lookout for this idea in practice. What is it? Applying business models to social problems, to develop new businesses that are efficient and financially self-sustaining the way a for-profit would be, but tackle solutions to social problems where there is some market failure, like a non-profit would. They figure out a way to do good, and turn a profit, that they reinvest in doing more good.

Examples include Dr. V and Mr. Green who cite the 30 second efficiency, low cost, high volume model that allows McDonalds to serve hamburgers, and applied it to eye cataract surgeries in India. PBS has a very cool series all about social entrepreneurs called The New Heroes. Watch them, they are great videos.

This encompasses two topics: entreprenuerial spirit and social consciousness, both on the rise according to experts, based on a shifting of generations in the work force.

In my Urban Economic Development class with Barry Rubin, there is a high focus on entreprenuerial trends, because starting new, smaller businesses is a great way to generate more jobs in a community (as opposed to first-wave development strategies of "smoke-stack chasing" which involves regions competing to attract large manufacturing plants). It's also the preferred way for up-and-coming smart workers to make a living. Current college graduates are pretty good at thinking outside the box, and are getting more comfortable with risk, creativity, and want ownership over our work.

Patricia Martin calls these people "RenGens," which stands for Renaissance Generation. I found her description fascinating, because I can see how it describes my peer group.

Ren Gens are..."eco-conscious; they ... are willing to accept products that are flawed but authentic rather than slickly produced and inauthentic. They want to make a difference. They want to live many lives. They don’t want to be told, “You can’t be an architect and a poet.” ... Because they are both idealistic and cynical at the same time, they have learned to trust what they experience rather than what experts tell them....They are also incredibly savvy about when they are being marketed to, so you cannot lie to them. "

She suggests that the "RenGen is the largest class of entrepreneurs the United States has seen in a long time. Not only are they driven to do original work, but they are going to want to live that out in originally designed careers. In order to do that, they’ll work hard to create their own enterprises... Their agenda is to collaborate, to connect and to create. They don’t respond to directive. They respond to teaming — where a ...problem is put on the table and everyone can jump in.

I think this is very true. So our two concepts, entreprenuerial spirit and social consciousness, appear to mesh well, creating a trend that may define the work of my generation.

Perks to the economic downturn

An economic downturn rarely seems to be a good thing. Particularly in the art world, where we battle the idea of art being less than necessity.

And the downturn is hurting the art market, according to experts. BUT a couple of interesting perks were pointed out by artists in this video taken at a Guggenheim fundraising auction, on the New York Times website.

1) "People who are in it only for money get weeded out in a way, and there's a good side to that." So art can be purchased by true art lovers, rather than those just looking to make an investment. It seems artists like this idea. Rushton tells us they're not really in it for the money, anyway.

2) "When the prices are lower more museums and public institutions will be able to acquire them [pieces of art]." If more art is in museums and public institutions, more people are exposed to the art. If the art can only be afforded by mega-rich private individuals, fewer people have access to it. As administrators, I think we all generally believe better art access = better world.

Michelle Facos, beloved museum/art history professor, exposed us to the auction world last year. A highlight was a fieldtrip to Chicago and a visit to Sotheby's.

Sundance and Prop 8

As the academic portion of my graduate program ends in December, the experiential part will begin, and we will all go off to serve full-time internships in arts organizations.

I will be going to Park City, Utah, to work a seasonal position at Sundance Film Festival. (I'm thrilled!) I love festivals, but I don't actually know a lot about film, or what is going on in the organization, so I signed up for Google Alerts. Now I get a list, delivered daily to my inbox, of all related news articles with the words "Sundance Film Festival."

Thanks to google, I'm now up to date on the PR hot potato proposition 8 in California has turned into for Sundance. This is the upshot: Utah is full of Mormon influence and money. Many activist groups are angry about the sway the Mormon church seems to have had in passing prop. 8, revoking gay rights to marriage. Consequently, there has been a push among gay-rights activists to boycott Utah, to punish the Mormons.

Sundance reps are issuing statements that reconfirm the festival's consistent commitment to independent and diverse voices through creative work. Sundance has long been a liberal advocate of films with gay subject-matter, no question. So a boycott should exclude the festival, right?

It gets more complicated. Sundance utilizes for screenings a local theater owned by Cinemark, whose CEO is a "yes on prop 8" $10,000 donor, and also uses a Marriott hotel for festival headquarters, whose CEO Bill Marriott is also a prominent Mormon church member and prop 8 donor. (Full story here.)

So Sundance money, or indirectly the money of those who attend Sundance, is going toward these companies that advocates would call "the enemy." Is Sundance wrong, then, to do business with "enemy" companies?

My first instinct is to say the answer lies in how closely tied we perceive the leadership's personal values to be with company values. If the CEO donated his own personal money, to support an issue the company had no position on, is there no problem? (Cinemark has said the opinions and personal donations of their CEO have no bearing on the position of the company.) Possibly. But it is also possible a CEO's personal decisions reflect on his company inseparably.

We don't want civic leaders to be involved in sex scandals. Why? Because that would reflect poorly on the rest of us, who pay his salary with public dollars. Or because it proves he has values not in line with ours, rendering him unable to do his job the way we would like. Either way, we might agree the personal values of other types of leaders in the public eye cannot be entirely separated from their professional work.

Granted private companies are held less responsible to the people than are public officials. But we vote on who stays and who goes, just the same; in one case with our ballots in an election, in the other with where we spend our dollars in the free market.

So Sundance has a choice, to not spend its dollars with a company whose leadership holds values the festival finds morally reprehensible.

But perhaps this is a case of the ends justifying the means. Sundance Film Festival is a fundraiser for the Sundance Institute, a non-profit organization whose mission is to support and develop independent artists and audiences around the world. Sundance has a good mission, and to accomplish it, it needs screening theaters and hotels. And in a restricted geographic region, there simply aren't a lot of options.

Who they choose to do business with is inevitably a value statement, but in this case, is one that is overshadowed by the stronger value statement Sundance makes with its history of supporting and nurturing filmmakers of all ethnicities, backgrounds, and sexual orientations. By giving a launching platform to minority voices, they do better than they would if they refused to do business with differently-valued parties entirely.

(learn more about Sundance here.)

the girl effect, and new marketing

A guest speaker in our Fund Development class shared this ad campaign with us. I have passed it on ten-fold since then because I think it is so brilliant (and a good cause!).

Watch this:
girleffect.org

There are a few things that make this video so captivating. The music gives it a rhythm and emotional momentum. The design (font, color, movement) is well done; easy to navigate, effective. But I also think it is unusual because it treats the audience as a thinker. You better read fast and keep up. It is respectful in that way; different from the "whiter! brighter! better for you!" commercials from retro days of marketing past that treat you more like a drone to be inundated with preferences. It treats you as a person who is capable of making choices, and invites you to join the group of those who are committed to making some type of change (buzzword of the year). It's more personal, as if it's having a two-way conversation with you as an equal, about a problem you can fix together. This is appealing, as we all like things that make us feel smart and capable.

Others are catching on:

Starbucks and voting

HPV prevention (click on "HPV facts on tv")

Do these ads hold your attention? What is it about them?

the Lovemark

I learned about the Lovemark from the PBS show, The Persuaders, about the multi-billion dollar advertising, PR, and marketing industry. We watched it for a marketing course, and have talked about it ever since.

The idea of the lovemark is this: People become emotionally attached to certain brands, inspiring “loyalty beyond reason.”

Lovemark brands are brands who spawn commitment among consumers, whose loyalists do not only like the product the company produces, but love the brand itself; what it stands for, the personality it embodies, and what they feel it says about them that they affiliate themselves with the brand.

Examples include Apple, Jeep, Target, Louis Vuitton, or Harley-Davidson.

(You hear people say “I am a Mac person.” This does not just mean they use apple computers; but rather it suggests an identity expression of the type of person they see themselves as being.)

Sports teams are a strong example. Being a Detroit Redwings fan is not just about hockey, it’s about a whole culture. A ticketmaster executive, speaking in one of our classes the other day, said there is a forty-thousand-some waitlist for Greenbay Packers tickets; talk about loyalty.

Tying this to arts, a classmate brought up the fact that in Europe, people feel loyalty to their local arts organizations, the way we feel loyalty toward sports teams here in the US. I want to know this: what is the formula that inspires loyalty, for a non-profit organization? A strong brand image? Just great marketing?

Are there some arts organizations that have captured it here in the US? Like the MET? By what strategy? And how can we incite this kind of loyalty in to our own organizations? If not only for moral support, our financial future would certainly be more steady with lovemark status.

How do we become a lovemark?

A day of politics

I live in Bloomington, unofficial camp of three more B’s - Barack, Biden, and Baron (Hill), all of which are dominating our screens and airwaves down here. And regardless of my political leanings, I find it hard to not think of Kennedy when I see Obama on TV, waving gallantly with his young family. And I like thinking about Kennedy for a couple reasons, in the context of signaling.

Signaling is the conveying of some meaningful information, through a would-be less meaningful object or action, when the two are positively correlated; such as a diploma signals a person has achieved a certain level of education and presumed intellectual abilities.

Here are a couple more Kennedy/art examples.

When I visited Washington DC for the first time, my parents took my brother and me to all the Smithsonian museums and on the capitol tour. I remember seeing the extravagant china dishware sets and other historic pieces Jackie Kennedy had acquired to restore the White House. It did seem like our leaders lived lavishly, but I did not think it wasteful. Rather, it invigorated in me a proud notion of what being an American meant. We are a country of people that appreciate fine furniture and art work, where quality and aesthetic value is important; to the president and his family, which reflected well on the rest of us. Jackie’s dishes are a signal of values.

When President Kennedy was working to establish the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in the 1960’s, he recognized that artists often bite the hand that feeds them, by creating work that criticizes and challenges American values. Even so, they should be publicly funded, as a value statement, to exemplify that the United States was stronger than our Cold War enemies, and all other nations that restrict the freedoms of their citizens. Public funding for the arts is a signal that though we may not agree with the art itself, we support an artists right to create it. NEA money is a signal of American values.

Granted, this cannot be the sole argument to justify public funding. (If it were, we would be obligating the government to fund a portion of every industry it finds favorable to American values.) It has to be combined with other reasons, in order to justify funding the arts. And Rushton has given us lots of other reasons to chew on, from market failure to the communitarian shaping of public taste. But the Kennedy point is among my favorite.