What Young Audiences Want - WSJ.Com

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OTHER FREE CONTENT SIGHTINGS SEARCH QUOTES & RESEARCH FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL What Young Audiences Want Advanced Search Symbol(s) Name EDITORS' PICKS Has Goldstar Events cracked the code? Mutual Funds | ETFs Real Time: Has the Internet advertisement made public records too public? By TERRY TEACHOUT June 23, 2007; Page P16 Revived Bill: The immigration law is making a return to the New York Senate.

Strike Out: The third time's not The under-40 crowd is the Holy Grail of every fine-arts performing a charm for summer movies. group and presenter in America. Everybody wants it -- but nobody Podcast: What franchisers are knows where to find it. "Every year expeditions went out holy grailing, looking for in a franchisee. and next year relief expeditions went out to hunt for them," Mark Twain

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Online Today | Law Now, though, it looks like somebody has finally found the money. Wash Wire | Deals Goldstar Events, a California-based online company that sells half-price

More free features, WSJ blogs tickets to live performances in Boston, Chicago, Las Vegas, Los and data. Angeles, New York, San Diego, San Francisco and Washington, is successfully reaching young audiences with personalized Web-based MORE EDITORS' PICKS marketing techniques that match buyers with events. BLOGS Most Popular Posts To become a Goldstar member, you go to www.goldstarevents.com and fill out a simple seven-question form that asks you to choose your 1. A Ray of Hope for XM-Sirius Enthusiasts favorite kinds of entertainment from this list: classic rock, classical MORE FROM TODAY'S JOURNAL 2. Winners & Losers: The music, comedy, family, film, jazz, popular music, spas and massage, $ Subscription may be required | Subscribe Now Blackstone Chronicles social events, sports, theater and two catch-all categories, "performing 3. Taking the Short Route arts" and "unique ideas." That's it -- there's no membership fee. (Goldstar RECOMMENDED ARTICLES 4. Bob Friedman: Blackstone's makes its money by adding a small service charge to each ticket.) You Lawyer-in-Chief Caution: Yellow Ahead then receive a weekly e-newsletter listing available performances in your Buy, Rent -- Or Toss? SEE ALL BLOGS area, along with special last-minute email offers. Tickets are bought Paging Mr. Perelman online and picked up at the box office at the time of the show. Giving Lamps a 'Green' Light MORE FREE CONTENT What to Wear Under Summer Clothes >> Markets Data Center Goldstar's slogan is "Great Nights Out for About the Price of a Movie." Recommendations by loomia What's This? >> Video That's a neat capsule summary of what it seeks to do. By offering its >> Blogs members an ultraconvenient way to purchase heavily discounted surplus WHAT'S NEWS >> Forums tickets to undersold performances -- and by sending them >> Interactives custom-tailored weekly e-mailings touting a wide-ranging variety of • Prosecutors Urge Dismissal of KPMG Indictments >> Autos events -- the company hopes to attract young people who aren't yet in the • Is Bear Stearns Tip of Iceberg? >> CareerJournal habit of attending live performances. Nor are its discounted offerings >> RealEstateJournal • Dow Jones Deal Talks Intensify second-class: Goldstar's 2,000 venue partners include such well-known >> StartUpJournal • GLG Partners Moves Closer to U.S. Listing >> OpinionJournal groups as Arena Stage in Washington, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, the • Two Agendas: Why Iran, U.S. Stand Far Apart >> MarketWatch Boston Celtics, the Chicago Bulls, Chicago Shakespeare, the Los >> AllThingsDigital Angeles Philharmonic, the New York City Ballet, the New York MORE Philharmonic, the San Francisco Opera and Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre. WHAT'S POPULAR

And does it work? Absolutely. Goldstar Events now has 315,000 1. The Baby-Name Business members, two-thirds of whom are under the age of 45 and go to the 2. High-Tech Boom Helps 'Untouchables' Rise movies at least once a month; 75% of them do not buy season tickets or 3. Clothing Shoppers Wheel and Deal subscriptions to any performing group. Moreover, Goldstar's younger 4. Book Debunking the Deity Is Surprise Hit members are far more ethnically diverse than the average big-city 5. Lookahead: No Rest fine-arts ticket buyer. "Our venue partners tell us that they always know

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when they're putting on a Goldstar evening," says Goldstar CEO Jim MORE McCarthy. "All they have to do is look at the audience. More color, and fewer gray heads." ADVERTISERS LINKS What's This? | Get Listed Goldstar members are, in short, precisely the sorts of people that Hot Stock Alert performing-arts groups dream of reaching -- and the company knows a Oxford Funding (OTC: OXFD) Subprime Mortgage lot about what they like. Each time you purchase a Goldstar ticket, you Restructuring Firm receive a postshow email asking you to evaluate the event you saw. This www.oxfordfunding.com gives the company a fast-growing user-preference database that it uses to Scottrade Online Broker $7 online trades. Fast, accurate executions. 285+ offices evaluate the popularity of its offerings. In addition, Goldstar polls its nationwide. members on a regular basis, and the most recent survey, conducted in www.scottrade.com May, speaks volumes about the fast-changing entertainment habits of the Hot Stock Alerts for Monday! Internet generation. Breaking News Just Issued on PRGJ Watch Stock React This Morning www.wallstreetnewsalert.com By margins ranging from substantial to overwhelming, under-40 Goldstar members:

• Feel that going to the movies is "easier" and "more convenient" than attending live performances.

• Prefer buying tickets online (and strongly prefer not to buy them over the phone).

• Own iPods and prefer purchasing songs "one at a time" to buying entire albums.

• Use TiVos and other digital video recorders to view TV programs at a time of their own choosing.

• Trust Web site user reviews far more than print-media reviews by "major local columnists." According to Goldstar, "More than 30% of respondents said negative user reviews on a Web site would 'strongly discourage' them from seeing a show. This is about 15 times more respondents than would be discouraged by a bad columnist's review."

• Feel little or no "sense of obligation to support important arts and cultural institutions with ticket dollars."

Not surprisingly, Goldstar has responded to this survey by adding a user-review feedback feature to its Web site (it goes live today). But what about performing-arts organizations? What lesson can they learn from Goldstar members? The answer is as loud and clear as the fat lady's high C: If you want to keep your doors open in the 21st century, you'd better scrap the cultural entitlement mentality that has long dominated the marketing of the arts in America and start trying out new business models that make sense to postmodern audiences. When it comes to the fine arts, young people want what they want when they want it -- and if they can't get it, they'll go see a movie instead.

Mr. Teachout, the Journal's drama critic, writes "Sightings" every other Saturday and blogs about the arts at www.terryteachout.com. Write to him at [email protected].

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