Beth
Aplin
Partner, The
Henderson Aplin Partnership
Beth Aplin, an information and knowledge
management specialist, has spent 18 years working with a huge
range of arts organisations to help them select, implement,
review, refine, and evaluate their systems and processes.
She feels that in order for an organisation to work effectively
and efficiently systems should be explored in their widest
sense – both people and technology.
She is a ticketing system expert and during her eight years
at Select Ticketing she installed PASS in 44 venues worldwide
and then as Customer Service Manager worked with these same
organisations over a long period to help them manage and exploit
the system. During this time the critical importance of staff
involvement, collaboration, skills and empowerment became
clear to her.
Since becoming a consultant in 1998 she has worked with a
wide range of arts clients helping them in the following ways:
* Customer Care exploration, benchmarking and collaborative
training
* Train the trainer training
* Exploration of the working relationships between departments
* Systems (in their widest sense) audits and troubleshooting
* Facilitating board and management retreats
* Staffing reviews
* Change management and guidance
* Project management and guidance
* Reviewing how audience data is gathered and used practically
& strategically
* Internal communications re-evaluation and guidance
* Web site and e-marketing reviews and exploitation
* Ticketing, marketing and fundraising system audits and stock
takes
* Ticketing, marketing, fundraising and CRM system selection
* Region wide ticketing system feasibility studies
* Region wide audience analysis and benchmarking exercises
She co-authored “The
Thirst for Knowledge” report in 2003 funded
by Arts Council England, Scottish Arts Council and Arts Council
Wales a country wide review of how arts organisations had
responded to the ability to gather substantial audience data.
Audience Data
UK (ADUK) was established as a direct result of the reports
recommendations. She contributed to “Lend
us a Tenner” the recent ACE publication considering
pricing strategies for arts organisations. She regularly speaks
at conferences and seminars, delivers national training tours,
is vice-chair of the Arts
Marketing Association, and chairs AMA conference.
Rae Bassett
Audience Development Manager,
QPAC
Merryn Carter
Project Manager, ADVICE,
Australia Council for the Arts
Merryn Carter has over 20 years experience
in arts marketing, having worked as a marketing, development
and audience research consultant with performing arts companies
and venues, festivals, galleries and visual arts organisations
around Australia. She has both a Bachelor of Music and Master
of Business Administration degree from the University of Melbourne.
Merryn has also worked as marketing manager for the Sydney
Symphony, Melbourne Theatre Company and the Australia Business
Arts Foundation. She is one of the most experienced arts marketing
researchers working in Australia today, and is currently working
for the Australia Council for the Arts as national manager
of the ADVICE project (audience data and visitor information
collection enterprise).
Tony Faure
Previously Regional Vice President,
Yahoo (South
East Asia) and CEO ninemsn
F ounding shareholder in MyTickets
Tony is a digital media entrepreneur,
investor and advisor. After more than a decade as a magazine
publisher he became passionately interested in internet media
in the mid nineties, and subsequently sold the first ever
banner ad in Australia, for which he is admired and despised
in equal measure! He founded Yahoo! Australia in 1997 and
went on to become Regional Vice President for South Asia.
Later he founded and then sold online DVD rental company HomeScreen,
and was most recently CEO of ninemsn from 2006-2008. Tony
has been a board member of several digital media companies
including Seek, ninemsn, i-select as well as the Internet
Industry Association and the Internet Advertising Bureau.
He is a founding shareholder in MyTickets
and advisor to the board. He lives in Sydney with his wife
and four children, from whom he learns more about the internet
than he does from any of his colleagues. He is passionate
about entertainment of all forms - but especially music and
movies - Chelsea football club; and cars.
John Paul Fishbach
Director, Auspicious
Arts
John Paul has a long history of producing
and directing theatre, festivals and site-specific events,
from the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival in Los Angeles to the
International Puppet Carnival in Melbourne Australia and now
the Australian premiere of The Santaland Diaries.
John Paul is passionate about Independent Theatre. Author
of the Auspicious Arts Incubator's mantra, "The Market
is Security, Funding is Insecurity" he created a two
year pilot project aimed at improving marketing and audience
development for the independent theatre companies of Melbourne.
He is currently working with Arts Victoria to assist small/
medium independent companies with ticketing, building patron
data bases, working with privacy legislation and e-marketing.
He has lived and worked in the U.S., Denmark, England, Bali
and Canada and now makes his home in Melbourne where he works
directing, producing and creating festivals. In partnership
with John Paxinos he is helping small independent arts organisations
with business skills marketing and audience development through
the Auspicious Arts Incubator.
Andy Gray
Account Manager (QLD), Pacific
Micromarketing
Andy manages the Queensland business
of Pacific Micromarketing, a consumer marketing services business
that helps its clients acquire, grow, retain, reactivate &
optimise customer relationships. With eight years experience
of applying geodemographic segmentation across three international
markets, Andy is well-placed to advise clients on how to maximise
the application of tools such as Mosaic®.
A member of the Australian Marketing
Institute, Andy has presented to diverse groups who share
a common interest in augmenting their customer & market data
with Mosaic® to deliver truly actionable insight. With its
broad client base across Australasia, Pacific Micromarketing
draws upon the shared experience of these clients to drive
successful outcomes for the arts sector.
Amalia Hordern
Customer Services Manager,
The
Australian Ballet
Amalia Hordern is Customer Services
Manager with The Australian Ballet, overseeing the ticketing
of annual subscription seasons in Melbourne and Sydney which
attract over 28,000 subscribers, as well as working interdepartmentally
to integrate the Ballet’s customer relationship management.
She has been instrumental in The Australian Ballet implementation
of Tessitura and the development of the company’s online
ticketing and database management.
Amalia has previously worked on the St Kilda Festival and
St Kilda Film Festival, and spent five years with the Canberra
Theatre Centre and Canberra Ticketing, where she managed the
ticketing requirements of a wide range of presenters, from
professional to community based and across a variety of artforms.
Prior to entering the world of ticketing,
Amalia worked as a dancer, dance teacher and Pilates instructor,
and was Artistic Director of Canberra Dance Theatre from 2002-2005.
Amalia holds a Bachelor of Arts from the Australian National
University and is currently completing a Masters in Arts and
Cultural Management through the University of South Australia.
Craig McMaster
Chief Executive, The
Showbiz Group
Prior to joining Showbiz, Craig held
a variety of senior positions in the entertainment and leisure
industries including senior management roles with Ticketek
Australia and New Zealand, culminating with Craig’s
appointment as Ticketek CEO from 1999 - 2001, and the securing
in excess of 25 major contracts under his leadership, including
the operational ticketing management for the Sydney 2000 Olympic
Games. Earlier in his career, Craig has also held senior or
general management positions with some of Australia’s
leading entertainment and services companies; including Village
Roadshow Corporation, Hoyts Cinema Corporation, Pepsico
International and McDonald’s Corporation. Showbiz is
Australia’s leading event packaging and premium ticketing
provider. It specialises in the sales and marketing of premium
ticket, travel and accommodation packages with theatrical
and entertainment events, tourism campaigns for events, and
sales and marketing of packages to major corporate clients.
Showbiz also services many of Australia’s leading customer
loyalty programs, including Qantas, American Express, NRMA
and the Commonwealth Bank. Craig holds positions as Special
Advisor, Major Events for TTF (Tourism and Transport Forum,
and roles as both Executive Councillor and member of the Helpmann
Awards Organising Committee for the LPA.
Tim Munro
Chief Executive Officer, Theatre Royal
Tim has lived and worked in Hobart
for most of his life, primarily as a lighting designer, production
manager and theatre technician. After a career in the public
sector, he joined the Theatre Royal’s technical crew
in 1995 and becoming head of the lighting department in 1998.
Tim was Operations Manager of the Theatre Royal from 2000
– 2004 and was appointed to the position of CEO of the
Theatre Royal in April 2004.
As a theatrical lighting designer he has toured theatre productions
extensively to most states of, (and many festivals in) Australia
and also to the UK, Canada, Malaysia and many times to New
Zealand.
Tim is a member of the APACA executive,
sits on several Arts Tasmania panels, and was formerly chair
of the Australian Script Centre and a board member of is theatre
ltd. He also teaches theatrical lighting and runs workshops
for many primary secondary and tertiary students and consults
on theatre development.
Stuart Nicolle
Managing Director, Purple Seven
Stuart is the managing director and
founder of Purple Seven, a U.K.-based tickets analysis software
firm that offers the award-winning Vital Statistics box office
analysis system. Vital Statistics is currently used by more
than 100 venues and audience development agencies across the
U.K. and Europe, America and in Australia.
Stuart is an experienced market researcher
and data analyst and has worked for many prestigious arts
organizations in the U.K. He has been a guest lecturer at
the University of Warwick on the subject of quantitative research
and is a frequent speaker at arts conferences and consortium
meetings in the U.K. and Europe.
Destry Puia
General Manager, The
Events Centre
Destry has worked for a variety or
organisations in Australia and New Zealand including independent
theatre companies, festivals, large metropolitan arts organisations
and regional and metropolitan Councils. For the past three
years Destry has held the position of General Manager of The
Events Centre on the Sunshine Coast. Destry began his theatre
career as an usher and has worked in most parts of the theatre
including bar, box office, technical department, wardrobe,
marketing and on stage.
Destry is a previous committee member of the Arts Industry
Council of Victoria, previous member of the Victorian Association
of Performing Arts Centres (VAPAC) and is current President
of the Northern Australian Regional Performing Arts Centres
Association (NARPACA), the key peak body responsible for collaborating
with the Queensland Government on key venue management challenges,
arts industry matters and regional touring strategies. Destry
has an Arts Degree in Social Science and in 2006 was named
“Young Manager of the Year” by the Australian
Institute of Management for the Sunshine Coast region. Destry
is the proud dad of three beautiful daughters and husband
to his exceptional wife Poppy.
Tina Rettke
Customer Services Manager, Geelong Performing Arts Centre
Tina started working in the theatre
industry in 1977 in Canada. Although employed as an usher,
she very quickly found her way in to the Box Office. She has
continued to work in Box Offices her whole working life. Her
current role as Customer Services Manager at the Geelong Performing
Arts Centre includes the management of the Box Office and
Front of House operations, the co-ordination of the IT infrastructure
and the phone system as well as being the Privacy Officer.
Tina was also Chair of the VAPAC Box Office Managers network
for 6 years.
GPAC is a regional Performing Arts
Centre located 75 kms south west of Melbourne, consisting
of a 300 seat flat floor theatre and an 800 seat proscenium
arch theatre. GPAC also manages a 1500 seat concert hall in
Geelong for Deakin University. GPAC’s Box Office has a staff
of 10, 2 Ticketek terminals and 5 Provenue terminals. Tina
joined the Ticketing Professionals Conference committee in
February 2006.
As a member of the Geelong Repertory
Company and has enjoyed many lead roles over the last 20 years.
Some favourites include Eliza Doolittle in Pygmalion,
Amanda in The Glass Menagerie, Christine Vole in
Witness for the Prosecution and Sylvia (the dog) in Sylvia.
Tim
Roberts
Principal Consultant, ARTS
Australia
Tim
Roberts has over twenty years experience in ticketing and
arts marketing throughout Australasia and internationally.
Tim specialises in CRM and audience development and analysis
for the arts and has undertaken ticketing and marketing projects
for clients throughout Australia, New Zealand, USA, Singapore,
Hong Kong, Malaysia, South Africa, Turkey and Great Britain.
He regularly consults with arts venues, organisations and
arts ministries around Australia. He lectures for the AIM
Master of Arts Management degree presented at Sydney Opera
House, School of Arts Management at the West Australian Academy
of the Performing Arts (WAAPA) in Perth and has lectured
for the School of Arts Management LASALLE-SIA College of the
Arts in Singapore and presents regularly at numerous industry
conferences nationally and internationally. Tim is co-author
of FULL
HOUSE: Turning Data into Audiences with Roger Tomlinson
with editions published in 2006 by the Australia Council,
Creative New Zealand and two other international editions
planned for 2008.
Tim
Roberts, Chair
Principal Consultant, ARTS Australia, NSW
Tina
Rettke
Customer Service Manager, Geelong Performing Arts Centre,
VIC
Brenda
Fehlberg
Box Office Coordinator, Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, TAS
Amalia
Hordern
Customer Services Manager, The Australian Ballet, VIC
Peta
Bazzo
Box Office Manager, Bunbury Entertainment Centre, WA
Destry Puia
General Manager, The Events Centre, QLD
Chris
Patrick
General Manager, Capella Cultural Centre