It?s hard when you fall between two stools, not least because it hurts, but also because it?s difficult getting back on your perch. This is made even harder when you?re a small arts centre on the edge of a very large city, says Howard Buckley.
Millfield Arts Centre is a 362-seat receiving venue and a grade two-listed building that runs community education schemes in Edmonton, in the North London Borough of Enfield. 15 minutes from the centre of London, we count ourselves as a very small fish in a very large and polluted pond. We have to fight for our space in a very crowded marketplace.
Although we are in London, we must consider ourselves a provincial venue to make the local community see us as their cultural provider. We have taken great care to understand the distinct groups in our catchment area and realise that many of the residents have no specific attachment to the borough.
While many arts organisations can feel sure that local press coverage communicates to their whole catchment area, we cannot. The people who read the local papers are our core older audience members and getting a story covering a dance, drama or multicultural piece simply doesn?t generate additional audience. With so many ways for Londoners to receive their news, we concentrate on providing effective and accurate listings information, while working with visiting companies to explore the potential for editorial in the larger papers. Transitions Dance, for example, will get the ear of the Evening Standard more readily than Millfield Arts Centre. Through this the door for us to the nationals is inching its way open.
Vitally important is our print distribution. Like many London venues, we use a distribution company, but only sporadically due to financial restrictions. In the main, distribution is done in-house and in a department of two this takes time. We don?t blanket cover the borough but cover a specific demographic and postcode with the right product. A little bit of research saves a lot of time and effort.
We share a problem with many urban venues: that of a fluid and transitory population. When I arrived, Millfield had a database of over 34,000 customers. We have now culled the majority of non-attenders and have the number down to 14,000. We must be even more vigilant in a community that is constantly in a state of flux, or else our customer information will spiral out of control again.
We are building a solid foundation for a successful future and shoots of growth are appearing. Sales for this spring season are up 15% overall and more community groups are using our facilities than ever before. Perhaps falling between two stools and finding our own niche is not such a bad place to be after all.
Howard Buckley is Marketing Manager at Millfield Theatre and Arts Centre.
t: 020 8887 7305;
e: h.buckley@millfieldtheatre.co.uk;
w: http://www.millfieldtheatre.co.uk