ANN ARBOR SUMMER FESTIVAL INC

Our mission is to present a world-class celebration of the arts and entertainment that enriches the cultural, economic, and social vitality of the region. Our vision is to present the best possible artistic experiences to as many people as possible through excellence, diversity, and relevance.

Founded in 1984, the festival has grown from a small summer cultural event into a 21-day multi-disciplinary festival that offers dozens of performances, activities, exhibitions. As champions of accessibility, 90% of our 100+ events are offered free to the public. For three incredible summer weeks, we transform our community into an open celebration, a place where friends, family, neighbors, and visitors can connect and share in artistic inspiration, creativity, and community spirit.

Our goal moving forward is to secure the festival’s reputation as a major cultural event in the community, as well as a premiere artistic enterprise in the national and international festival-presenting arena. We seek to nurture the ways in which the festival has become more of a cultural and social destination, and less about a specific concert-going experience.

1. Deepen Audience and Community Engagement
• Days and Hours of Operations: Improved alignment of festival days and hours of operations to periods of maximum audience participation.
• Programming and Venue Alignment: Continue to line-up programming that will address the most popular audience interests; utilize a wider range of appropriate venues for each program (with selection based on genre, audience segment, capacity needs, and cost considerations).
• Volunteering: Mature the festival’s volunteer program and expand levels of volunteerism within the community.
• Marketing and Promotions: The festival will increase its marketing reach (e.g., number of people engaged, unique visitors) and improve returns on marketing (e.g., increased attendance volumes and frequencies, greater loyalty).
• Targeted Engagement Initiatives: The festival should continue to implement initiatives that engage the core audience. At the same time, we will also identify and implement special initiatives each year that further improve audience diversity.

2. Build a Financially Sustainable Organization
• Renewed focus on fund development as a priority.
• Building festival endowment.
• Delivering a profitable and lower-risk season.
• Improving cash flow.

3. Strengthen Key Partnerships and Develop New Mutually Beneficial Relationships
• Continue to reinforce the strong and mutually beneficial relationships between the festival and the City of Ann Arbor and University of Michigan.
• Solidify our relationship with priority organizations that can benefit the festival the most holistically, and cultivate multiple relationships/linkages.
• Develop the next tier of partnerships – organizations that can provide significant benefits to the festival across a smaller number of criteria but are also high priority partners. Cultivate these relationships via the festival staff and committees.

4. Further Enhance and Extend the Reputation of the Festival
• Clarity and Communication: Defining, articulating, and demonstrating the unique value proposition of the festival.
• Association: Alignment to high-profile sponsors, funding agencies, partners, media and/or other events that reflect our values.
• Talent: Attracting and retaining top talent of all kinds (e.g., board, staff, seasonal management, volunteers, high-quality artists).
• Openness: Working in partnership with our community and audiences, listening to and implementing feedback, being open to ideas, broadening the audience of our programs.
• Advocacy, Thought Leadership and Giving Back: Supporting growth of our creative industries, serving as a leader and resource for local/national colleagues in the arts presenting arena, being a good community citizen.

5. Continuously Improve Leadership and Administration
• Year-round organization optimization.
• Continued outsourcing of non-core functions.
• In-season cost structure improvements.
• Infrastructure and technology improvements.

The festival is highly capable of advancing this strategic plan and fulfilling its mission and vision. There is outstanding leadership among our full-time staff, whose combined expertise and efforts have helped to grow the festival significantly in recent years. A team of seasonal managers, contractors, seasonal employees, interns, and volunteers support the staff. A diverse, knowledgeable, and actively participating board of trustees (28 members in 2013) also guides festival progress, and engages in committee work to further our core strategies of engagement, financial health, partnerships, reputation, and leadership and administration.

With a tailwind of solid operating performance and a strengthening balance sheet, our financial health is solid and demonstrates the significant impact that individual and corporate supporters can have on our fiscal well-being. We have worked diligently these past few years to diversify our funding portfolio and expand our base of support. On average, nearly 45% of our annual contributed revenue comes from individual donors who believe in our mission. Compared to similar festivals, we have a smaller budget than most, but have managed to do more with less. Despite challenging funding environments and state budget cuts to the arts, our festival is thriving and expanding.

The external strengths that will contribute to our reaching our goals include our founding partnerships with the City of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan. Additionally, we have a growing roster of community partners, including corporations, educational institutions, non-profits, and community groups that participate in the festival each year. We have repeatedly won support from major granting agencies like the National Endowment for the Arts and the Michigan Council for Arts & Cultural Affairs, as well as several international grants. As our programming expands, so does our network and sphere of influence. In recent seasons, for example, the addition of storytelling performances has helped forge a presenting partnership with Michigan Radio, our local NPR affiliate, who have collaborated with us on many successful shows such as An Evening with Ira Glass, The Moth Mainstage, and A Prairie Home Companion. We engage innovative educational outreach partners and seek to attract new partnerships with local organizations and businesses that have not previously collaborated on community-based art projects.

Moving forward, our capabilities will be strengthened by a number of research tools. We recently completed a fundraising study, polling long-term festival donors for strategic planning feedback. We also have plans for a demographic study to help us better understand our audience and their needs. With the completion of our 5-year-plan in 2014, the organization will also undergo a renewed process of strategic planning. Key board and festival community members will be engaged in this process.

The Ann Arbor Summer Festival is recognized as one of the leading multi-arts festivals in the country today and is a pillar of quality of life in our community. We introduce audiences to groundbreaking local, national, and international talent. Our programming emphasizes works of artistic excellence that push creative boundaries, invite direct participation, and attract diverse audiences.

In fulfillment of our mission, we partner with individuals and organizations on innovative outreach opportunities that foster community engagement with the arts, such as free workshops, master classes, and children’s activities. We provide a vibrant arts destination that draws thousands of people to downtown Ann Arbor, resulting in an economic impact of $1M+ annually. We showcase the talent of southeastern Michigan, presenting regional artists, engaging local food vendors, and employing hundreds of seasonal staff. We are a community treasure, attracting 300+ community volunteers annually. Almost half of our contributed revenue comes from individual donors.

Our efforts have been recognized by awards from the NEA, the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs, the Ann Arbor Community Foundation, the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, and the French American Fund for Contemporary Theatre.

In 2013, we hosted over 100 events in 9 venues. Two out of eleven Mainstage shows sold out, with many others close to capacity. Over 400 local, national, and international artists performed. Special outdoor attractions drew large crowds, and the season featured more artists than ever before. Over 15,000 people gave to our onsite donation program. We launched a festival app that had 9,754 downloads. By all accounts, our 30th anniversary season represented our strategic plan in action.

Now as we enter our fourth decade, we aspire to further our reputation as a leading mulit-arts festival. To do this, we must strive to be dynamic and evolving. We must pursue new engagement models that can deliver artistic excellence to our audiences, be it through innovative educational outreach or large, interactive spectacle. We want to further diversify programming, appealing to, for example, more families, the burgeoning tech sector in Ann Arbor, and our multi-cultural audience.

In order for us to continue to grow and engage the hearts and minds of our community, we need to diversify our funding portfolio and expand our base of support. To keep pace with audience shifts and market changes, we must strive to have greater impact and relevance in our community while developing capitalization strategies to foster growth.

Since our founding in 1984, the festival has weathered many tests. Today, the festival is much stronger, more confident, and more dynamic than ever. Our charge for the years ahead is to sustain our organization while testing and presenting new experiences for our community that encourage and develop a sense of place and ownership for all audiences.