Austin (No Longer Lyric) Opera Rebrands, Austin Business Journal
From the Austin Business Journal:
Thursday, October 9, 2014, 1:03pm CDT
Austin Lyric Opera rebrands as new season kicks off
Austin Lyric Opera has rebranded itself as simply Austin Opera as a way to present a simplified and clearer message to the public ahead of the Nov. 8 launch of its 2014-2015 season.
Joe Specter, the opera’s general manager since 2012, said discussions about rebranding the arts group have been ongoing since he joined but it became a priority in December. The group hired the Arrow branding and marketing firm of Austin to lead the process and Venture Industries of Chicago for its website relaunch.
Austin Opera has a $3.9 million annual budget, with one-third of that money coming from performance revenue and the rest coming from contributions from foundations and companies such as HEB, Chevron, Applied Materials and 3M. The group holds its performances at the Long Center for the Performing Arts, where it has been a tenant since that facility’s opening.
“We saw that we had room to grow in how we were projecting ourselves to the community, because these days especially people make assumptions if you’re not out there telling your story,” Specter said. “We had recovered from a rough patch in 2011 and 2012 with the fallout from the economic collapse, and grown our subscriber base by 33 percent. We asked how we take that to the next level and tap into the energy of the feeling of cultural tourism that you get from coming to a performance.”
Specter said there will be a series of follow-up promotions and announcements as part of the rebrand in the coming months, with an “amplification” in the group’s media buying, its digital marketing, direct mail and telemarketing efforts.