The plays are now the thing for Key Gordon Communications. The Toronto shop has been named agency of record for The Shaw Festival following a formal review.
Valerie Taylor, director of marketing for festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. said the organization received nearly 40 responses to an RFP issued in mid-August.
The account had been with Toronto’s Scott Thornley + Company for the past seven years, but the agency did not pitch on the business. Taylor said that after marking its 50th anniversary this year, The Shaw wanted to adopt a new marketing approach to kick off its next half-century.
The themes for 2012, she said, are “re-energize,” “re-invigorate” and “refresh.”
“After that benchmark year, you start to look forward at how you look in the marketplace,” she said. “It was a perfect time to look at a new agency of record, to get a fresh new approach.
“It really hinged on how we were going to move forward into the 51st season. [The new agency appointment] was to bring a fresh new approach to our creative feel and tone, [and] a new look to our brand and marketing platforms.
Established in 2001, Key Gordon Communications has worked with organizations including The Lorraine Kimsa Theatre for Young People, and industry groups including Doctors Without Borders and Feed the Children.
“It was just their whole approach,” said Taylor of the decision to hire Key Gordon. “We knew that we could work with them. In a theatre company we have a lot of creative people on staff, and that’s crucial to the mix – to be able to work with our artistic director, our director of design – because we produce a creative product. They just really fit from the get-go.”
Taylor said The Shaw Fest is already in “fast-forward” mode on its 2012 planning cycle, with Key Gordon’s first work for the organization – a direct mail campaign targeting its more than 10,000 members – set to debut later this month. The first marketing to the general public will debut early next year.
Taylor characterizes The Shaw Festival’s marketing as a “good robust mix” that encompasses direct, an extensive social media presence featuring a dedicated Twitter feed (@Shawtheatre), Facebook, YouTube and Flickr, as well as print, radio and some TV.
The marketing challenge for Key Gordon, she said, is to create marketing capable of resonating with multiple constituencies across the entire continent (88% of Shaw Festival attendees travel more than 80 kilometres to take in play). “We’re not a spontaneous decision… People have to plan to get here, and that’s always a challenge for any agency,” said Taylor.
Taylor said The Shaw is on pace to eclipse last year’s attendance figures. With three weeks remaining before the curtain comes down on the 2011 season, attendance is tracking about 6% ahead of last year – which was 262,000 or 67.3% of capacity for 749 performances.
