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The Friends of English National Opera (ENO) was set up to support the ENO company, which is dedicated to providing high quality, low cost opera in the language of our audience, says Samantha Cantrell.
ENO is a registered charity and the Friends department sits within the development section of the company, responsible for corporate, capital and major donor fundraising as well as the Friends scheme. There has been a supporters scheme (originally known as the Opera Club) since ENO was in its old home at Sadlers Wells in the 1970s. This was run by volunteers until the mid 1980s, who looked after ticket applications and catered at events. Gradually, paid staff were brought in to complement the volunteer team and the committee who ran the Friends. After a number of changes, the scheme became the Friends of English National Opera, run from the Coliseum by a small team of dedicated professionals. In the last five years, the emphasis has been on building a successful, consistent membership base administered by the Friends team, currently comprising a Friends Manager, Assistant and Events Officer. The membership level has risen to a steady 7,000 members and the scheme is run both to attract and retain members who, through us, develop a closer relationship with ENO as well as delivering a revenue stream for the company. The scheme has been re-launched twice in the last five years and there are plans to examine it yet again before the re-opening of the Coliseum in 2004. Each time, much care had been taken to ensure that members are well informed of changes that will be made to the scheme and that the financial demands made are not beyond their means. The most popular reasons for becoming a Friend of ENO are to receive priority booking for performances, to be able to apply for tickets to dress rehearsals and Friends events, and of course, to support the company. Whenever we have reviewed the scheme we have tried to ensure that these core areas are sustained.

Any amendments are also approved by the Friends Council, an advisory board which meets three times a year to discuss the scheme, initiatives and upcoming projects.

We practise a 'ladder of giving' within development, aimed at encouraging members to move up through the levels of membership and gradually become more committed to ENO. Some recent changes have brought significant improvements to our member retention and upgrade rates. We have started to source all of the applications we receive, to track the effectiveness of each initiative and campaign. Through this, for example, we have learned that a direct mail campaign to our audience is more effective in recruiting new members than a seat drop of membership leaflets. This has been really useful in determining how and where to publicise the Friends scheme, which campaigns to pursue and how much we should spend on them. One significant benefit of running the Friends with a full-time paid team is that we can provide regular and efficient feedback to members. We have a very close relationship with them and try to respond to queries and letters very promptly. There is some competition in London between arts organisations for a small pool of members with a specific interest (we find that some rotate their allegiances from year to year!). Part of the reason many of them stay with us is related to the quality of service which we provide to them.

Samantha Cantrell is Friends Manager at English National Opera e:scantrell@eno.org