Theatreworks

Marketing Potential in Backyard Bashes

After finding three homeowners to provide their yards for its annual benefit gala in July, Theatreworks in Colorado Springs, Colo., is extending the marketing potential of backyards with a new outreach program called "America's Backyards."

"Meet your neighbors, if you haven't already," a company's e-mailed flyer says; and in the process, your neighbors will meet Theatreworks.

Inspiring the program are two plays Theatreworks is staging this fall highlighting the American backyard: August Wilson's Seven Guitars and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, both set in 1948. "While they explore vastly different worlds, when packaged together they ask us to consider our own backyards, neighbors, fences, perspectives, communities, histories, and relationships," the theater flyer says.

To promote the plays, Theatreworks is inviting its mailing list patrons to invite their neighbors to backyard barbecues or cocktails, and the theater will then send a representative to each party to talk about the plays. Hosts get two free tickets, and guests get "greatly discounted" tickets. The theater will also help with recipes and entertainment.

For its annual fundraising gala July 13, Theatreworks organized a progressive dinner at three private gardens in Colorado Springs' upscale Broadmoor Neighborhood, with guests visiting the one home for appetizers, moving to the second for the main course, and ending up at the last house for dessert.

September 2, 2013

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