Carolyn Murray outlines a Merseyside initiative designed to increase the benefits to arts organisations of a family-friendly approach.
Family Friendly Merseyside (FFM), the free arts and cultural listings magazine for families, was launched in spring 2005. The magazine is the public face of the Merseyside family-friendly scheme, with 40,000 copies published quarterly and distributed across Merseyside, Cheshire, and West Lancashire. In its first year, over 1,300 families joined the database to receive the magazine by post, and readers responses have been overwhelmingly positive.
The initiative is founded on the premise that as no two families are quite alike, a one-size-fits-all approach cant work. Rather than trying to dictate what families should like, FFMs approach is to offer them an informed choice by providing comprehensive event listings including useful information such as the venues facilities, how long a show is and its age suitability. An Eating Out section features restaurants that pass the family-friendly test administered by mystery shoppers. For families a trip is often a whole package kids have to eat! Both this and a new Prize Draw page designed to boost the mailing list are very popular. They also act as a comfortable entry point for people unfamiliar with the arts.
The twelve arts and cultural organisations that joined the scheme at the outset included theatres, museums and art galleries. Over the first year, heritage sites, local-authority event teams and seasonal festivals and events organisers have all become involved, bringing the total contributors to 21 overall. Most organisations join the scheme to increase their family audience and to raise awareness that their venue and programme are family friendly.
FFM seems to be one of the few schemes nationally that is using print as the main public medium for its work, rather than a website or e-bulletin. This decision was not taken lightly, bearing in mind the costly and time-consuming nature of producing and distributing a magazine. The key deciding factors were access (about 40% of families still do not have home access to the web and one local authority explicitly refused to co-operate if the project were web-based), convenience, and attractiveness to advertisers and other partners.
With a magazine you can be inspired while browsing through it and maybe try something you wouldnt have done otherwise. FFM readers appreciate the chance to keep the magazine in their bag, flick through it, refer back to it and share it amongst friends, family and colleagues. Having made the case for the print format I must confess, however, that we are now planning a website in addition to the magazine, to ensure families can access the listings information in the way that suits them best!
Many cultural organisations and attractions already offer a family-friendly welcome, the right facilities and suitable programming for their visitors. Others want some support to develop their approach and to enhance what they are doing so that they become more attractive to families. A concerted family friendly approach can help keep everyone in an organisation focused on what they are providing for families. It can also give extra weight to decision-making on family provision details for example, whether to have high chairs on display in the venues café. Being involved in a family friendly scheme has given some organisations a greater focus on family marketing and increased the amount of marketing they do for family audiences.
Discussions are now underway with a neighbouring county about expanding the FFM scheme geographically. We are also working with the tourism department at Liverpool Culture Company on ways to attract family day-visitors by positioning Liverpool as a top family-friendly tourist destination. Income generation continues with added fervour, and as initial funding from Arts Council England, North West is virtually exhausted, Liverpool Culture Company has committed to a second years funding. To maintain the original vision for the scheme to be sustainable means walking a tightrope between reducing our reliance on public funding and adopting more commercial practices, such as increasing advertising sales and database exploitation.
Theres also scope to analyse the events and activities that have been listed, to establish what cultural provision specifically for families looks like, and where the gaps are, if any. I also want to encourage the sharing of family-friendly experiences and knowledge between the people responsible for programming, education and marketing in cultural organisations. The scheme needs to develop tangible ways of measuring the impact of this work. After all, the schemes stakeholders all know that Family Friendly isnt a quick fix scheme; theyre in it for the long haul.
Carolyn Murray is an Audience Development Manager at TEAM (The Entertainment & Arts Marketers (Merseyside) Ltd). Issue 6 of FFM is out now. Issue 7 (Sept 06 Jan 07) comes out in late August.
t: 0151 709 6881; e: ffm@team-uk.org