arts & business council

MetLife National Arts Forums Series

Arts & Business Council of RI
Providence, Rhode Island

The Culture Consumer: How the performance they see Saturday night affects your bottom line Monday morning
05/09/2005

Presentation by Patricia Martin, President & Founder of LitLamp Communications Group, Inc.

The forum presented preliminary results of new research on the attitudes and behaviors of cultural consumers related to their desire for cultural experiences as well as on their feelings towards businesses who market their products and/or services through partnerships with arts and cultural organizations. The findings show that arts organizations and businesses have the potential to create highly successful partnerships by taking advantage of similarities in target audiences.

Creative partnerships have become an important issue in our community as fewer and fewer corporate headquarters remain located in RI, and as corporate philanthropy and foundation grants for the arts continually shrink. A few companies in our market are moving in this direction, and a number of companies are very interested in pursuing sponsorship opportunities in the arts, but they need some assistance in finding the right fit.

Jim DeRentis, executive vice president of Retail Banking & Marketing at Bank Rhode Island, shared with us what he found significant about Ms. Martin’s research results: “I believe what the presentation demonstrated was that cultural consumers make up an even larger percentage of the consuming public than had previously been understood.  With 65 percent of the general public being cultural consumers on some level, the potential to reach the bank's target customers is even greater using arts and culture as part of its positioning strategy.”

In order to tap into this trend, the arts community in Rhode Island will need to do further research to understand the cultural consumer in our region and the relevance of the information locally.

As a result of this forum, plans are currently underway to conduct research on the cultural consumer in Rhode Island, southeastern Massachusetts, and northeastern Connecticut. The forum also generated interest in developing a sponsorship brokerage program where the Arts & Business Council of Rhode Island (A&BC/RI) could serve as a facilitator, go-between, and coach to help create sponsorship partnerships in our region. A&BC/RI is also currently working on developing metrics around the benefits of sponsorship to show companies that are interested but tentative about making the commitment. Ideally, we will meet with a sampling of marketing executives at arts organizations and businesses and then be able to document case studies to serve as examples of successful partnerships.