I have just been asked by my brother Cyril if I am not afraid of donor Fatigue?
This seems to be the looming fear in most people’s minds as Theatre continues to be fuelled by sponsorship Naira as against ticket sales.
Sardauna, my play first hit the N29m mark at the cutting of the budget. But as we are about to open our doors we would have crossed the N40m mark almost rivaling Emir Sanusi at N42m
So far, I have been told that we have sold only N150k at the box offcie and one young girl just sent N100k to me directly for 5 tickets.
Emir Sanusi broke our box office records by selling N1.5m at the gates beating previous record held by Emotan which sold N800,000.
Awo and Aremu didn’t give me up to N200k at the gates combined despite both taking almost N70m in budget.
On the back of this, we announced a N200m budget for this year and looking at ramping it up to N300m by next year making Cyril ask the question.
I however remain highly optimistic that by Dec 2023, we should be looking at N500m for 2024.
This dec we will be adding a full documentary of back stories to be handled by Olisa Adibua and that should ramp up the budget by another N10m
How do we plan to continue to fund all of these, seeing the dismal ticket sales.
It’s simple. We have seen that attendance has increased by over 200%. Emir Sanusi filled up the halls in both cities, and we turned back over 200 people.
Sarduana will fill the 1000 seater Congress Hall of the Transcorp Hilton for the two days it will run
Two filled the Glover Hall to the brim and we had to turn people back.
For Emir Sanusi, even the Gov of Kwara State didn’t get a seat. What this means is that the market is growing deeper and that strategies need to be devolved to harness it.
For us at Duke of Shomolu we are more of an impact platform..our vision is dual driven
We want to tell the stories to impact, energies and inspire people into a new Nigeria hence our emphasis on filling the halls as against ticket sales
Our shows out of Lagos are mostly free. In Lagos and Abuja 60% of tickets are complimentary and our messages are designed to just get pple into the hall.
This is working as we have recorded over 150,000 attendees. We are hoping to hit the 200,000 mark with sardauna and the four shows in December with Nnamdi Azikiwe and Ladi Kwali in March 2023
So for us sponsorships and bulk wholesale ticket sales remain the key strategy.
We have taken over N2b from corporate Nigeria in the last 4 years and another N300m from high networth individuals
So do I fear Donor Fatigue from this market? I will say NO
Simply because, as the brand continues to grow, it’s building strong goodwill with corporates wanting to climb more on it to not only push into their markets but also keying into the impact part of the franchise
We have worked with over 1000 actors becoming one of the largest employers of thespians in the market second may be only to Bolanle Austen Peters Tera Kukture, enabling dreams within the sector and fuelling hospitality, Media and other such players in other sectirs including SMEs
This year alone, we have spent over N8m on graphics alone, berthing the Katunga Media design firm. We have opened over 100 bank accounts in many banks who support us to mention a few.
It is this empowerment that the corporates are keying in. They have huge social impact and marketing budgets and the trick is to build relationships that takes you to those areas that they see value both material and societal driven.
Another startegy is to tie the productions to specific markets. So for example Awo will attract a huge conglomerate like Odua Investments for the impact reason and an Emir Sanusi will attract Access Bank for same reasons
So we design productions and face the markets. Ogiame Erejuwa II tickled Itsekiri elites and pple like Juluis Rone and Amaju Pinick came out strong
So for these reasons my brother Cyril, I do not fear Donor Fatigue but instead do not even belive we have scratched the surface
The industry is N3trillion by some estimations. Sponsorships make up about 40% of these with international flows, ticket sales, product pkacements and data driven revenues taking the rest.
How much of these does Theatre take? A paltry and roughly estimated 3% so there is room for growth and this is why I can dare to dream to target N100m in 4 productions in one month
Another strategy is the high networth individual targeted startegy. With an individual network of about 10,000 people who can all easily drop N200,000 for bulk tickets, I can easily raise N20m from these sources.
This strategy is what I aim to deploy during Annonymous Nipples my sex driven play to be directed my Elvina Ibru
With Ufok Ibaan in uyo, 16 individuals gave us the over 25m budget. Sardauna one individual gave us 95% of the budget and another individual finishing it off.
We will hit 2,000 actors by Dec 2023 and begin to position our digital arm which will prerecord these preoductions for online digital release.
We will also be archiving them so that I can donate them to the National archives when God is ready to call on me to come and help him with a huge producion in heaven.
So Cyril my brother, hope I have answered your questions
Thanks for your concern
Duke of Shomolu
