Looking ahead to private sector fundraising in 2025

The New Year is a terrific time to review your private sector fundraising activities. The question to ask is: are you achieving the best return on investment for your time and spend? As part of your review, national trends in private sector support to the arts are important to be aware of, but, in my work as a State Manger Development & Partnerships (WA) for Creative Australia, trends need to be considered alongside local context.

One analysis is to consider your balance of business sponsorship against philanthropic support (donations, grants from trusts and foundations and bequests). From my perspective, discussion of business partnerships and sponsorship have been drowned out by talk of philanthropy this year. It’s hardly surprising. Philanthropic support of the arts has grown enormously in Australia over the last 20 years or so. The best guide of this trend was the annual Australian Major Performing Arts Group (AMPAG survey, supported by Creative Partnerships Australia) of the largest twenty-nine performing arts companies in Australia and last conducted in 2020, told us that philanthropic support had risen by 949% between 2000 and 2019 while business sponsorship of the arts had trailed behind at 88% over the same period [1].

For good reason, the industry’s gaze has been drawn to this promising new source of funding and a growing number of major arts organisations are now wisely putting more of their energy into raising philanthropic support. The rewards speak for themselves, exemplified by some very large donations like Lindsay & Paula Fox’s incredible pledge of $100 million to the new contemporary wing of the [2] and the Andrew and Nicola Forrest’s recent contribution through the Minderoo Foundation to ECU’s WA Academy of Performing Arts new city campus in Perth [3].

However, as we applaud and re-align to this growing generosity towards the arts, we must remember that philanthropic giving is not the best option for everyone…not yet anyway. Corporate sponsorships and/or business partnerships still offer great returns for artists and arts organisations and in many situations may offer a better, and shorter-term, option.

For example, for many small to medium arts companies and organisations whose audience are more transient, it can be hard to develop the long-term audience relationship you need to be successful in securing and sustaining corporate sponsorships and/or business partnerships. In their 2022-23 annual report, La Boite Theatre in Brisbane raised $50,000 in sponsorship and $70,790 in donations, and Barking Gecko Theatre in WA raised $205,000 in sponsorship and $238,000 in donations [5]. The small to medium sector can also sometimes have limited access to audience data when using external ticketing contractors, which makes raising donations very difficult indeed.

Likewise, festivals, including fringe festivals and music festivals, are also proving successful in securing business partnerships and sponsorship, given the valuable branding, entertainment and hospitality opportunities. In 2022-23 year, the Adelaide Festival raised $1.8 million in business sponsorship and $640,000 in donations [6] and the Queensland Music Festival raised $1.2 million sponsorship and $65,000 in donations [7]. Some are starting to buck this trend, like the Melbourne Fringe Festival which raised $717,118 in donations and $212,000 in sponsorship [8], so it’s not cut and dry.

And then in regional areas, most of the regional arts organisations I observe build partnerships with local business or big business operating locally, offering either cash support or savings. This is not only the case in the Pilbara and the Goldfields in Western Australia, where the resources sector is so dominant, but also in areas like the Southwest and the Great Southern. Two examples are Margaret River Open Studios [9] and CinefestOZ [10], both of which have been successful in partnering with local and state business more easily than raising philanthropic support.

There is very strong evidence now that in Melbourne, Sydney, and to some degree Brisbane, philanthropic support is leading the way. In the 2022-23 year, Queensland Symphony Orchestra raised $1.5 million in donations and $673,377 in sponsorship [11] and the Belvoir Street Theatre in Sydney raised $2.39 million in donations and $463,000 in sponsorship [12].

While philanthropic support is on the rise, organisations that are successful have been investing in philanthropic fundraising for many years and it has taken many years to build these relationships and the support. Business partnerships and sponsorship can be much quicker to secure, even if it is more volatile. This snapshot also suggests that geographic location, the makeup of your audience and what your mission is, contribute strongly to your most effective best private sector engagement strategies and that this is unlikely to change for a good while.

Another argument for there being fewer business partnerships may be the changes taking place around how big business engage with communities, including the arts, increasingly moving from the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) approach to an Environment Social & Governance (ESG) approach. How the arts are best to respond to this new strategic community engagement model may not yet be clear to us. My sense is that the benefits the arts & cultural sector offer business will be no less valuable in the future.

Research tells us that ‘a positive reputation’ is highly sought after, and a critical objective to business efficiency [13] and community partnerships can enhance it. While the arts sector can respond to this, our sector can also offer branding, tickets to events, unique hospitality, innovative product activations, access to new audiences, speaking opportunities, networking, access to high net worth individuals and decision makers; and can also stimulate and support creative thinking, social inclusion, youth development, community well-being, story-telling, education, skills development, teamwork, and so on. The Sponsor in the UK recently made a strong argument for business sponsorship of the arts which is well worth reading [14].

Another reason business partnerships and sponsorship may not be top of the agenda is the increasing complexities associated with engaging corporate Australia.  A recent Churchill Fellowship I conducted in London and New York provides a somewhat non-diverse look at how major arts organisations overseas are managing partnerships that could lead to types of disruption [15].

So, my message for the New Year is to re-visit the potential of corporate sponsorships and/or business partnerships. Don’t put all your eggs in the philanthropic basket. Local business support, and support from big business operating locally to you, could see quicker wins, if less long-term.

Remember your organisation may have much to offer the business sector. Value what you have and what you can offer, whether in a metropolitan or regional area. If I was asked to try to identify the secret to success in securing business support, I’d say start the conversation and go from there. Businesses are unlikely to knock on your door, so make sure you knock on theirs, particularly where you feel it makes good business sense to both parties. Reach out to one of Creative Australia’s State Managers, Development & Partnerships for assistance – we offer a free fundraising coaching service and are experienced across many and varied situations. We are here to help.

James Boyd, State Manager Development & Partnerships (WA)

Footnotes:

[1] Creative Partnerships Australia, Tracking Changes Report 2020

[2] National Gallery of Victoria, “Fox Family Pledge $100 Million Towards NGV Contemporary, Australia’s Largest Gallery of Contemporary Art and Design”

[3] Edith Cowan University, “$30 Million Philanthropic Partnership for WAAPA”

[4] Page 17, La Boite Theatre, 2023 Annual Report

[5] Page 20, Barking Gecko Theatre, 2022 Financial Report

[6] Page 34, Adelaide Festival Corporation, 2022-23 Annual Report

[7] Page13, Queensland Music Festival, 2023 Financial Statements (Signed, Fully Searchable)

[8] Page 16, Melbourne Fringe Ltd, 2023 Financial Statements

[9] Margaret River Region Open Studios – Australia’s largest open studios event

[10] CinefestOZ, Current Partners

[11] Page 15, Queensland Symphony Orchestra, 2024 Annual Report 2023

[12] Page 70, Belvoir St Theatre, Annual Financial Report 2023

[13] Ipsos, Building Reputation 2023: The Link Between Corporate Reputation and Business Efficiency

[14] The Sponsor, “Sponsorship of the Arts: Is It Really Worth It?”

[15] Churchill Trust, “James Boyd (WA) 2020”