Dreaming Big & Making It Pay
The future of arts funding lies beyond ACE
Here I champion the alternative income streams that turn NPO’s offer of stability into sustainability
Arts Council England (ACE) has just launched the National Portfolio Organisation (NPO) Applicant Guidance with an application deadline of 15 December. Set this against a change in their Strategic Framework and it might be easy for organisations to don the ACE blinkers
But now is exactly the time to think big!
Over the last few months, I’ve facilitated staff-trustee away days with arts organisations determined to look beyond the obvious
Here I share insights for:
existing NPOs looking to plan an holistic five year vision including ACE
prospective NPO applicants balancing multiple income streams with big dreams
Join me for a 30 minute free consultation
Explore multiple income streams, profile raising or unpack NPO planning. Email studio@francesarnold.co.uk
How can NPOs - well established within their communities - form a bold plan that pays for itself?
I traced my PlaceLab routes through Weardale & Teesdale to the Cumbrian edge of the North Pennines
And in a village hall nestled amongst fells and farms, I joined staff and trustees of Highlights Rural Touring Scheme
Murton Village Institute is one of 56 rural venues hosting vibrant and thought-provoking performances across Cumbria, Northumberland and County Durham. Performances made possible by dedicated volunteers, an ambitious team, inspirational performers and rural communities passionate about local access to arts and culture.
As an arts organisation without a venue, establishing a self-sustaining financial model is like finding gold at the end of the rainbow!
Only, it’s not a myth.
It’s just so often hidden amongst a prevailing culture of fixed term funding cycles, commissioners’ current zeitgeist and bespoke programme delivery. All of which are invaluable to the sector and the communities they serve. Yet all so temporary. I’ve met and worked with North East organisations who exist within this culture yet are finding ways to break free of these financial restraints. What sets these organisations apart is a way of (re)thinking about their assets, an acute understanding of their communities, and the graft to find their niche audiences.
Highlights are already working differently by delivering a self-sustaining creative workshop programme and a ticketing model that attracts loyal audiences, all within rural Northern communities. What’s more, it’s connected with the core work of the organisation’s performance and participate programmes. Each of these financial models has huge potential for growth when thought about as part of a jigsaw of income streams that provide sustainability for the organisation and continued, high quality provision for communities.
If an early bird ticketing system is already a hit, what other forms of discount or incentive could help secure bookings and attract new audience members? If a craft workshop can be booked up months in advance and cover it’s costs, how can the be expanded, adapted elsewhere or raise the profile of upcoming performances? What large scale, community-led fundraising could be realised when supported by such a loyal and large audience base?
And what turns these possible financial futures into a reality?
Telling stories.
Telling relevant, exciting stories to specific audiences who are ready to pitch in. Telling stories that invite engagement to generate big, local benefits.
Final space remaining for organisations planning an NPO application
Contact me studio@francesarnold.co.uk for more information
Can ACE funding really provide NPO prospective applicants with long-sought after stability?
An outdoor space in Gateshead for “free range humans” was the perfect setting to gather staff and trustees of imagination-fuelled Newcastle based Moving Parts Arts
At Birkheads Wild we immersed ourselves in the trees, meadows, play spaces and hen houses to explore how a puppetry company that attracts festival commissions, international workshop sales and community partnership projects could step into the next five years of organisational growth
Five years funding covering core costs and delivering creative excellence, for everyone, everywhere. The offer from ACE to prospective NPOs, too often working like a start-up without the angel investors, is tantalising, right?
Stability; staff paid for hours worked, more than 6 months guaranteed income and the potential to think long term.
But what happens when your vision couples public engagement with commercial practice?
More than ever, prospective NPOs need the hustle and graft that secured short-term funding, commissions and income streams independent of grants. ACE is not going to pay for everything. And focusing a business model on NPO requirements will only lead to a narrowing of an organisation’s vision and overreliance on a single income stream. The future lies in multiple income streams; in annual accounts where ACE funding doesn’t represent 90% of the total income.
Moving Parts Arts has set a pathway to success based on a unique balance of income streams. Securing commissions is a skill, delivering on them raises organisational profile and generates assets and ideas that can be reused or adapted into future work. Delivering paid for workshops to professionals around the world in puppetry is generating income, supporting local freelancers and strengthening a professional community who champion the company in return.
Having commercial income streams are a necessary component of any sustainable business plan, NPO funding or not. And if you’ve put in the hustle to make that happen before NPO status landed, you’ve got the foundations for sustainable organisational growth with it.
Set apart the work that doesn’t fit the ACE mould and look holistically at how it can be sustained, or grow, through other means; through your stakeholders, your knowledge of the context your operating in and it’s potential opportunities, through your existing paying audience. When you piece this all together with an NPO application, you have a viable business plan for the future, not just a sticking plaster for today’s worries.
Final space remaining for organisations planning an NPO application
Contact me studio@francesarnold.co.uk for more information