American Conservatory Theater Case Study

Megan Pease

BME – 214924-01

American Conservatory Theater Case Study

December 3, 2016

Part I

Research Purpose

The purpose of American Conservatory Theater’s (ACT) research is to aid the theater in their planning efforts and to develop an understanding of the dynamics of the process in which individuals became ACT subscribers.  This research purpose is clearly outlined in the case study.  By conducting research in regards to looking at how individuals became subscribers to the theater, the theater will be able to gain information on what draws in subscribers and what types of changes can be made within the theater to increase their amount of subscribers in the future. This purpose is measurable in the way in which the information that they are able to find, can assist them with their future marketing plans and events within the theater to increase their amount of subscribers.  

Research Objectives

           American Conservatory Theater’s hope is to be able to gain background information ideally on the process of becoming a theater subscriber and use this information to create accurate and testable hypotheses.  This is the main objective of the American Conservatory Theater because they are one of the major repertory theaters located in San Francisco. Their objective is to be able to get a better understanding on how individuals decide whether or not to become a subscriber to their theater.  The three components of their research objective include the research question, the development of their hypotheses and the scope of their research.  The research question for their objective is, “What are the dynamics of the process whereby individuals became ACT subscribers?” However, the development of the hypotheses is not included or explained in the case study, but different potential reasons are given such as discounted tickets, supporter of the arts, preferred seating, etc.  These show several reasons in which the theater believes could be why individuals decide to subscribe to the theater, but the theater is not sure which reasons are more relevant than the others. The only restriction to the research objective includes those who have not subscribed to the theater but have visited the theater on many occasions, only subscribers will be looked at.

Research Design

            American Conservatory Theater will send out questionnaires to 9,000 theater subscribers via mail in order to conduct their research. These questionnaires will contain questions related to demographics as well as questions pertaining to why the subscribers initially chose to subscribe and what prompted their decisions.    A research design is important for the American Conservatory Theater because this information will be used as a means to better suite individuals whom subscribe to the theater as well as gain insight on how to get more individuals to subscribe as well.  Without a proper research design, the researcher may not be able to collect the information that is needed to make a sound decision or could lead the researcher to ask the wrong questions.

Sampling Method and Selection

            As was seen in the research design stage, participants will be selected based on the fact that they are subscribers to the theater, however whether the 9,000 subscribers are all of ACT's subscribers or a selection of their total subscribers is not mentioned in the case. The case does not specify how the 982 out of the returned 40% from that 9,000 are selected either.  Does ACT select them randomly or specifically select a certain percentage of each subscriber group (i.e.. Continual, Sudden and Gradual). The theater's selection process gives them a large number of respondents to work with which allows them to get a good idea from various populations within their subscribers.

Data Collection Method

            The data collection method used by the American Conservatory Theater will be in the form of answers to the questions that are asked in their mailed questionnaire.  These questions deal with the amount of time the subscriber has been a resident, their age, income, cultural activities and hours of television watched a week.  They also include questions about why they have subscribed to the theater such as; ease of ordering tickets, guaranteed tickets playing a role, if it was for the price discount, priority seating, how certain they are to attend and if they subscribe to support the arts, just to name a few. The case study explains that these questionnaires will be mailed out to 9,000 of ACT’s subscribers, however it does not give a timeline in which the questionnaires will be mailed back.  Without an appropriate data collection method, there can be several problems that could occur.  Timeliness of the responses could be a potential problem seeing that the responses that are needed could be delayed.  Also, there could be biases that are created due to the participants being pressured into picking only two main reasons that they subscribe to the theater rather than being able to select whichever of the eight choices apply directly to their decision to subscribe.

Data Analysis and Presentation

        American Conservatory Theater uses the questionnaire to collect their data for analysis.  In the case, tables are provided showing the percentages for each question broken into which subscriber group it pertained to.  The first table presented looks at the demographics of each of the three groups.  The mean scores are shown and broken down to look at how many years subscribers have been residents, their age, their income, their cultural activities and the number of hours they watch television in a given week.  The chart is laid out in an organized fashion that allows direct comparison between the three subscriber groups.

        The second chart presented focuses on the questions that pertain to benefit that are obtained by subscribing to ACT.  This chart gives the percentage of the categories that subscribers claimed where the most important benefits related to their subscription, each survey respondent was only allowed to pick two from the eight categories.  These categories include; ease of ordering, guaranteed ticket, price discount, priority seating, discount on special plays, more certain to attend, new play series and support for art.         This chart also is presented in a way that allows a direct comparison of all three subscribing groups making it easy to compare the three groups directly.

Part II

The NEA’s survey of public participation in the arts breaks out figures collected by the U.S. Census Bureau. It finds that in 2002, 17.1% of the U.S. population had attended a musical; in 2008, it was 16.7%, and in 2012, it was 15.2%. The drop is even more significant for plays, starting at 12.3% in 2002, and sliding to 8.3% last year. “Theater is one of the art forms that we’ve seen a consistent decline in,” says NEA research director Sunil Iyengar (Cox, 2013). Attendance at plays has been down consistently since 1992, and in the 2012 numbers, there were worrying dips among some of the theater industry’s target demos, including 55- to 64-year-olds and audiences who have reached high levels of education.