SERVICE USED: SEED FUND
BY: Phil Mestecky Development Manager for Strathearn Arts in Crieff
FOR: Hosting an Online Arts Festival
My name is Phil Mestecky and I work as the Development Manager for Strathearn Arts based in Crieff. Our community-led organisation aims to provide consistently high quality arts experiences which enrich people’s lives, bring the community together and raise the profile of Strathearn’s wealth of art and musical talent. Prior to the pandemic, we had been making great strides with these goals and were looking to expand and broaden our programme in 2020.
When the lockdown happened, everything came to a grinding halt and we had no option but to close our doors, cancel all of our events and bookings and furlough all bar one of our staff.
After a couple of months of wrestling with financial support applications etc, we decided that we couldn’t sit on our hands and wait for some grand re-opening as we still had no idea when or how that might happen. So we decided to focus on what we could do during lockdown and not what we couldn’t!
Having seen a number of arts festivals starting to happen online, the idea came to us to host our own. The goals were to acknowledge and support the local arts and music community and provide a range of activities and events that could engage with as wide a range of people in the Strathearn area as possible. Working with a number of other local groups and organisations we came up with the plan for S.O.F.A., the Strathearn Online Festival of the Arts.
At this point, thanks to a suggestion from Chris Grace of Chris’s Gigs and an email from The Touring Network arriving at just the right time, my attention was drawn to the Seed Fund. I picked up the phone and chatted through the idea with Bronwen.
For me, her positivity and enthusiasm for our ideas was just as important as her encouragement to apply for the seed fund. The process was simple, the form was easy to complete and the decision-making process was fast and painless with the result that in just a couple of weeks we had secured a useful “seed” from which to grow the event.
We then set about confirming the programme and securing sponsorship and getting the word out. In the end, the S.O.F.A. weekend comprised 5 music concerts (“pop”, folk, classical), 4 live events, 7 workshops (guitar x2, ukulele, dance x2, craft x2), 3 podcasts, 3 artists interviews, a literary event, children’s reading event and a junior talent competition. All events were free.
Attendance at the events varied considerably but, overall, we had a reach of 28,000, nearly 16,000 engagements and 35,000 mins of videos watched across the events. We also doubled the numbers of followers on Facebook as a result of the extra publicity and promotion involved. We regularly had 100+ people watching our concerts and our youth talent show had live voting with over 300 votes cast for the finalists.
Many of these people have not been regular attendees at arts and music events but may now be more aware of our organisation and become more receptive to future online or “real” events in future.
Thanks to the Touring Network and our other sponsors, all musicians and technical teams were paid what we could manage to acknowledge their contribution and they will all get a share of the £1500 donations raised during the event.
We have taken ourselves way outside our comfort zone with this event and, as a result, have learned a huge amount that will strengthen us as an organisation and give us confidence to try more scary things in future. To have Bronwen in our corner from the word go was enormously reassuring!
ABOUT SEED FUND: Apply for up to £500 to help you take your practice as a promoter or performer in a new direction. Whether you’re looking to visit festivals, or showcase events, or to develop new partnerships – this easy to apply, quick turnaround fund is for you. Find out more here
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