S1/E6: Cultivating Terror

LABNOTES is a production of SECTORLAB and is designed to help people at cultural organizations to challenge conventional thinking by presenting ideas from inside and outside our sector. These ideas are also put to use in consulting.

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Season 1 / Edition 6

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“Our challenge is that we have to fill 365 days of the year. That’s a lot of content”

That’s what Heather Morgan, Chief of Staff & Strategy of the cult-favorite theater chain Alamo Drafthouse, told me about one of their fundamental challenges – too much product.

But they’ve chosen to approach this problem in a strategic way: turning the days in which they consistently see the lightest attendance (Mondays through Thursdays) into opportunities to cultivate and develop niche audiences.

Enter ”Terror Tuesdays” and “Weird Wednesdays” -

We don't just watch horror movies – we live for them. And at every Terror Tuesday, we join hands to worship at the gore-soaked altar of slash, trash, thrash, and FUN! This eclectic series spans all decades, covering everything from seminal horror treasures to undiscovered DIY monster blasts. Terror Tuesday is the new ground zero for warming your black heart.

If you are a horror movie fanatic, this is relevant to you in a way that one-off screenings are not – the content is enticing, sure, but more importantly: you’ve “found your people.”

That sense of belonging is powerful - resulting in more consistent, repeat attendance, and, as marketing guru Mark Schaefer identifies in his book Belonging to the Brand, can “…spread your story better and farther than any advertising you could ever buy.”

Attendance for these kinds of presentations may not top the charts, but the loyalty generated by them make these customers more valuable in the long-term Plus -

• From a programmatic perspective, it allows them be more adventurous and screen things they might not otherwise (I can’t imagine them programming 1973’s Godmonster of Indian Flats outside the context of a “Weird Wednesday”).
  

• From a brand perspective, it reinforces their core value of a love for movies (and movie lovers) of all kinds, and further differentiates them from competitors.
  

• To further enhance loyalty, they build additional experiences (which they’re famous for – like interactive presentations, menu or cocktail pairings, pre/post-film activities) into these series to further build that sense of community.
  

• They increase the value of weekday programming.
  

They’ve credited this as part of the reason they’ve been able to buck trends in the larger theater industry. Interesting to note they program nearly twice as many films as the next highest exhibitor chain (I bet this has something to do with it!).

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OBSERVATIONS

• Like my episode on DR Koncerhuset’s Meditation Concerts, this is another example of how an organization could use a set of product lines, representing multiple deployments of institutional assets, to engage new audiences.
  

• Yes, our programming may be far more limited than “Alamo”, but you may have niche areas or patron groups that could be engaged in a similar way (perhaps patrons you’re NOT currently doing a great job at engaging, or are on the fringes of your “main product”).
  

• As Alamo demonstrates, these niches aren’t likely bringing in massive audiences, but the loyalty generated can make up for that (and, for us, can be leveraged through fundraising). I imagine the deeper & more specialized the niche, the higher likelihood of the natural “stickiness” of that community.
  

• The key elements of the formula, for me, are: (a) hyper-relevance to a target group, (b) represent a “deeper” dive into the subject matter, in some way, and are (c) consistently presented.
  

• …this led me to think about whether the programming processes at our organizations are equipped to be successful with a strategy like this – Alamo utilizes a team to plan their programming, while at a lot of cultural organizations it’s primarily driven by a single individual. That’s a lot at stake institutionally on one person (and their preferences), and there’s only so many hours in the day! I could see an approach where “product managers” help give the attention needed for these distinct areas.
  

I’ve been developing some concepts for how organizations might consider product lines like this – get in touch!

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