Introduction
I decided to do the field trip report on the Singapore Arts Festival which was an event that was carried out for a month from 15 May – 14 June 2009. It started in the year 1977 and the event was organised annually without fail. The Singapore Arts Festival incorporates theatre arts, dance, music, visual arts and special events. The Festival which is organised by the National Arts Council remains the largest singular event in Singapore’s arts calendar, inviting artists from more than 20 countries, offering more than 500 activities attracting up to 700,000 attendances.
I chose to compare the Singapore Arts Festival to the Melbourne International Arts Festival. It was first established in 1986 by the Cain Government as a sister festival of the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto and the Spoleto Festival USA held in Charleston, South Carolina. The Festival changed its name from the Spoleto Festival Melbourne to the Melbourne International Festival of the Arts in 1990, and adopted its current name, Melbourne International Arts Festival in 2003. This year the Melbourne International Arts Festival will be held in October 2009 therefore I decided to compare the Singapore Arts Festival to the Melbourne International Arts Festival in the year 2008.
Marketing Strategy for Melbourne International Arts Festival and Singapore Arts Festival
Place:
This year the Singapore Arts Festival held its opening act at the newly opened Marina Barrage on the 15th May 2009. This provided a new and unique experience for the event, as well as the participants and viewers. The Marina Barrage offers a fantastic view of the night lights of Singapore while being surrounded calm waters. Thus having a performance there may be nice on the eyes but definitely there are new challenges, such as limited amount of space, lack of activities after the event and ease of transport. But I believe despite such difficulties, the opening act put up was great and no doubt provided a memorable experience. Other than the opening act, the arts festival had performances and events all over Singapore covering many different places like dance performances, musicals, and plays were held at our prestigious Esplanade, Drama Centre and many other locations.
The Melbourne International Arts Festival held its opening act at the Federation Square in Melbourne itself. The Federation Square is a cultural precinct in the city of Melbourne. It comprises a series of buildings containing a public broadcaster, art galleries, a museum, cinemas, exhibition spaces, auditoria, restaurants, bars and shops around two major public spaces, one covered (The Atrium), the other open to the sky (St. Paul's Court and The Square). The majority of the precinct is built on top of a concrete deck over busy railway lines.
I found it similar to what the Singapore Arts Festival has done as both opening acts were held outdoors instead of in a ballroom. Not saying that it is better but both indoor and outdoor opening ceremonies have their own pros and cons. However the differences between the 2 sites for the opening act were the size, history and cultural values the place hold and the scale. There is no doubt the size and the scale of the opening act is linked, Singapore held its opening act at the Marina Barrage therefore with limited space there was only that much the act could do and how far it could go. The Federation Square had much more space and definitely could hold an act of a bigger scale with a bigger crowd, not only that the buildings around the Federation Square had activities related to the arts like museums, galleries and exhibition spaces. With all this completing with the history behind the place the Melbourne International Arts Festival would definitely be something Singapore Arts Festival can learn from to provide a similar experience.
Product:
Both Arts Festivals provide performances as a service and the event itself is the product. The Arts Festival also has tangible products like souvenirs shops and food and drinks stands at outdoor performances.
Promotions:
For the Singapore Arts Festival, Present your ArtsFest Club Card* or ArtsFest Ticket(s) to receive discounts for room rates at Marina Mandarin Singapore, redeem free Heeren Privilege Card at The Heeren Shops and many other discounts provided by different organisations. I particularly feel that the discount for room rates is targeted at tourist coming to Singapore for the Singapore Arts Festival and this will be a push factor for the tourist to visit Singapore or may even be a factor that will convince them to extend their holiday here.
As for the Melbourne International Arts Festival, I could not find any source that shows that they have promotions similar to what the Singapore Arts Festival has provided. Therefore I feel that if they do have such promotions they should advertise it so as to provide as a push factor for people to visit the event or start to look for sponsors to provide such promotions is they do not have it. Although the event may be successful as it is, there will definitely be no harm in providing more benefits for people to enhance their experience and increase satisfactory.
Partnerships:
The Singapore Arts Festival had Channel 5 to be their official TV station, OKTO to be their supporting TV station, Coca Cola Light as their official beverage. I feel that this is a very good marketing move as the media is a very strong tool to create awareness and hype for an event like this. They also partnered with Singapore Tourism Board, TOTE board, Shaw Foundation. I believe all this is to use them as an intermediary to allow more people to know about the event, especially tourists who are looking to travel. With such a huge event, a lot of financial backing is needed thus this event was sponsored by Lee Foundation, Urban Redevelopment Authority, Hong Leong Foundation, Vivocity, WingTai Asia, Raffles City Shopping Centre, Public Utilities Board, Suntec Singapore and SMRT.
The Melbourne International Arts Festival is different from the Singapore Arts Festival in terms of the sponsors; Melbourne International Arts Festival receives huge financial support from their Federal, State and Local Government and does not need to source for more sponsors to back themselves. This may be the reason why they do not have as much promotion as these promotions usually comes along with the sponsors’ company. However this does not affect the event much as both events get the financial support needed.
Price:
There are many different prices provided for tickets sold for the Singapore Arts Festival. I got the information provided below from the Singapore Arts Festival official website.
General Sales Discounts
Package Discount
Buy tickets to 4 or more shows and enjoy discounts of up to 15%!
- 4 or more shows - 15% discount
- 2 to 3 shows - 10% discount
Available through all sales channels.
Full-Time Students, NSFs and Senior Citizens (60 years old and above)
From 9 March 2009 onwards, enjoy 20% discount for any value purchase. Available through all sales channels. Limited to one ticket per valid identification pass per show.
Group Bookings
From 9 March 2009 onwards, purchase 15 tickets or more to any one production and enjoy 15% discount!
School Bookings
Heavily discounted student tickets, arts appreciation workshops and talks catered specially to schools are now available for booking.
As shown above many different discount rates are provided for people who want to experience the Art Festival. I feel that this is a very good move as there is a recession now and people may not really want to spend, this would probably motivate the people to purchase the tickets more.
As for the Melbourne International Arts Festival, they have 2 different kinds of prices for tickets. Firstly they provide 25% discount for the second ticket purchased for a performance from the same artist or company. The next one is to choose 3 performances for only $30. Similarly as the world goes through a global recession it is nice to see organisations to do something about the pricing although their ultimate aim is to motivate people to come.
People:
Both Arts Festivals have artists and performers from overseas as well as local productions, I feel that this presents a chance for the artists to learn from one another, be it performing skills or culture the Arts Festival will serve as a bridge between people from the event. Not only artist and performances learn, so do the audiences. People get to see how performances may differ in terms of culture and style.
Programming:
As for programming, I felt that the Singapore Arts Festival did well by deciding to carry out the whole event over a month, this way the events and performances were carried out at a comfortable pace for everyone. Nothing seems to be rushing and everything seems to be carried out smoothly without any huge glitches halfway. The whole Arts Festival also served as a medium for local artists to perform and there were also quality acts and artists from overseas to showcase their talents.
Whereas for Melbourne International Arts Festival it is carried out over a period of 15 days, the scale and magnitude of the event is so much bigger than the Singapore Arts Festival thus I feel that the events may not provide enough satisfaction or may even cause problems as things are rushed. Such an enjoyable event like the Arts Festival should be appreciated at comfortable pace and not rushed through. However I must say that the performances scheduled in the Melbourne Arts Festival were more prestigious and it looks as if there was more hype in Melbourne as compared to Singapore.
Packaging:
Both Arts Festivals provided packaging when marketing themselves and their products. Their packaging was similar, in the tickets promotion department. However Singapore Arts Festival were superior in the packaging provided out of the event, which is the benefits the Arts Festival tickets provide.
Stakeholders
Firstly sponsors would be part of the stakeholders, Channel 5, OKTO, Coca Cola Light, Singapore Tourism Board, TOTE board, Shaw Foundation, Lee Foundation, Urban Redevelopment Authority, Hong Leong Foundation, Vivocity, Wingtai Asia, Raffles City, Public Utilities Board, Suntec Singapore, and SMRT are example of sponsors which are stakeholders in this event.
Next stakeholder would be the consumers, who are the people that go to the event, for the Arts Festival the consumers would be audiences for plays, dance and musicals and also patrons who visit galleries and museums.
Suppliers who made the event possible are also stakeholders. Example National Arts Council which organised the event, local and overseas artists, performances and productions.
The local community for the event would also be a stakeholder, would be the Singaporeans for the Singapore Arts Festival and the locals in Melbourne.
The country’s government is also a stakeholder. The event may brand the country as a place to carry out such events. As Singapore is considered one of the place of the Arts in Asia this directly concerns the government as the event will thus represent the country.
Purpose of the Arts Festival
First and foremost such a huge event organised would have many benefits, as the organising country for a Arts Festival, locals can interact and learn from overseas performances and understand more about others culture. Other than learning, it is also a chance for artists taking part, be it local or overseas to make a name for them, or experience what is like to be on a big stage. Other than social benefits there are also economic benefits of such an event. With a huge event like that there would be a big amount of revenue that would definitely help during this time of economic crisis. This event may serve as a event to brighten up the locals life as things in the country may not be going well, once again the economic crisis may have dampen everyone’s mood but an event with this much hype would surely make us enjoy the experience for that period of time.
Tourism Benefits
An event like the Arts Festival will have a lot of awareness and people may visit Singapore especially for the event. Therefore this brings about tourism revenue, not only from the event but also the fact that the tourists are staying here for a period of time. Revenue will be earned even from outside the event itself. Tourists will have to find accommodation, spend on food and beverages, visit secondary attractions in Singapore, all these requires spending and thus will generate more tourism revenue for our economy.
In conclusion an event like the Singapore Arts Festival brings about benefits from different fields, from local artists interacting with overseas artists to generating revenue to improving the economic situation there are countless numbers reasons why an event like that would be organised and to organise the event every year since 1977 is no easy feat, and making the event successful adds on to the difficulties and expectations of such an event. The organiser, National Arts Council tries to make it a unique and different experience every single year and I believe that the event would get better and better as more years pass and in the near future we may be able to be the leading country in terms of Arts and Culture.
