Show Report

[tcb]

Apologies if there is already a thread on this but couldn’t find one.

I’ve been following The Show Report UK on Instagram which has started doing a weekly percentage capacity estimate which I find really interesting.

I know Broadway publish the weekly show grosses and attendance but I’ve never seen it done for the west end. I was just curious as to where they get the attendance data and if there is a way of seeing more info on west end shows.

[amyja89]

Thanks for the tip! I love stuff like this. Am I wrong to be surprised by Hamilton's bottom/low ranking across most weeks? Perhaps I'm just thinking back to the mad rush for tickets when it first opened. To be fair, the only time I've seen it was in that first December when the hype was crazy.

[Adalea]

That's so interesting, thank you!

[sph]

Thanks for that, given it a follow. How do they calculate those results though? They seem very generous, although I suppose it has been the summer holidays. It just seems odd that most, if not all shows are consistently scoring in the 80 - 100% region.

[partytentdown]

Surely this can't be anything but guess work from looking at ticketing websites, which are sometimes altered to make shows look busier than they are anyway? Unless someone at SOLT is leaking sales report data, which would be really dodgy, there's no single place that someone could get all this info from accurately.

[SilverFox]

Sept 2, 2024 6:55:05 GMT partytentdown said:

Surely this can't be anything but guess work from looking at ticketing websites, which are sometimes altered to make shows look busier than they are anyway? Unless someone at SOLT is leaking sales report data, which would be really dodgy, there's no single place that someone could get all this info from accurately.

No idea if this is what is being used, but SOLT DO maintain statistics of box office figures (and in the last report stating that "we are currently reviewing the content and purpose of the Box Office Data Report 2023"):-

SOLT link

so the information is there - just not publicly available and only released annually, it seems. Incidently, the lists of 20 Longest ... make interesting reading, especially the 'Productions' one. Stomp and the B&W Minstrels??

[Being Alive]

The figures on that new account are wildly inaccurate so everyone needs to take it with the biggest bucket of salt imaginable (to the extent they're borderline making some of these figures up out of thin air)

[c4ndyc4ne]

it could also very much be a 'which shows refuse to paper (hamilton) vs which religiously paper (a lot of them)' report

[Rory]

I've seen this on Instagram and I feel it could really damage the shows it highlights as doing less favourable business. I don't like it when it's not clear where they get their data from.

[Jon]

Sept 2, 2024 13:53:59 GMT Rory said:

I've seen this on Instagram and I feel it could really damage the shows it highlights as doing less favourable business. I don't like it when it's not clear where they get their data from.

I'm not sure it will do any damage given it's an estimation by one small account rather than official data from SOLT.

[c4ndyc4ne]

is it someone manually counting the seating plans?

[Being Alive]

Sept 2, 2024 14:09:13 GMT c4ndyc4ne said:

is it someone manually counting the seating plans?

I got into a bit of a back and forth with them in DMs and yes, essentially.

But this doesn't account for agent allocations, producer holds, any other held back seats etc.

There was one week they said Farm Hall was selling better than Next To Normal and Tina.... Farm Hall had two levels closed and was on seat fillers, but they counted the top 2 levels being sold out rather than closed so the figures are absolutely useless and a waste of time.

[andys]

Sept 2, 2024 6:55:05 GMT partytentdown said:

Surely this can't be anything but guess work from looking at ticketing websites, which are sometimes altered to make shows look busier than they are anyway? Unless someone at SOLT is leaking sales report data, which would be really dodgy, there's no single place that someone could get all this info from accurately.

It is assumed by those in the ticketing business that it is someone or several people looking at seating plans online and doing some very basic calculations without real actual data. No one seems to know why, but at least one producer is not happy about it.

[sph]

Ah, well if it's all just guess-timations then the data presented is somewhat useless. It's an unfollow from me.

[Rory]

Sept 2, 2024 18:41:22 GMT andys said:

Sept 2, 2024 6:55:05 GMT partytentdown said:

Surely this can't be anything but guess work from looking at ticketing websites, which are sometimes altered to make shows look busier than they are anyway? Unless someone at SOLT is leaking sales report data, which would be really dodgy, there's no single place that someone could get all this info from accurately.

It is assumed by those in the ticketing business that it is someone or several people looking at seating plans online and doing some very basic calculations without real actual data. No one seems to know why, but at least one producer is not happy about it.

Don't blame them. They have Slave Play always bottom of the pile and it's pretty full most performances.

[andys]

It is really pointless to look at one measure in isolation too. A long running show in a huge 2000+ house may well sell at around 50-70% but has already recouped costs years ago so can sail along happily just covering its overheads. Meanwhile a new limited run in a smaller 500 seat or less house with an expensive star needs to squeeze every pound out of every seat every night. %age occupancy is not the only important measure.

[BurlyBeaR]

I don’t see the point of it. They say they want to “foster a thriving theatre community for all”. How is what they’re doing assisting with that? Even if it was accurate?
Seems pretty pointless.

[Being Alive]

I know for a fact one very high profile producer is absolutely fuming at the inaccuracies

[andys]

Sept 2, 2024 21:43:47 GMT Being Alive said:

I know for a fact one very high profile producer is absolutely fuming at the inaccuracies

Agreed, we may be talking about the same producer. I don't blame her/him.

[141920grm]

gone now

[Jon]

Sept 6, 2024 17:25:23 GMT 141920grm said:

gone now

I reckon they got a cease and desist from SOLT 

[Being Alive]

Quite right.
Thank god this nonsense is over.

[SilverFox]

Sept 6, 2024 17:26:43 GMT Jon said:

Sept 6, 2024 17:25:23 GMT 141920grm said:

gone now

I reckon they got a cease and desist from SOLT 

I think more likely from one of the theatre groups DMT / Nimax / ATG / LWT etc - but yes they seem to have been forced to abandon an ill-conceived and evidently inaccurate scheme.

That said Broadway has issued - AFAIK accurate - statistics for many years, it does not seem to have harmed shows, and proves to be a very interesting read. What is the WE scared of?

[andys]

I know that a cease and desist was talked about this week.

It does open a conversation about whether audience data should be made more openly available, which I'm not sure about. Other commercial businesses don't have to divulge that level of information - no one has a right to know how many tins of soup Sainsburys sell each day, for example.

[Jon]

Sept 6, 2024 20:35:57 GMT andys said:

I know that a cease and desist was talked about this week.

It does open a conversation about whether audience data should be made more openly available, which I'm not sure about. Other commercial businesses don't have to divulge that level of information - no one has a right to know how many tins of soup Sainsburys sell each day, for example.

Box office data for theatre is really a Broadway thing, it doesn't happen anywhere else in America, even off Broadway doesn't report their weekly grosses.

Weirdly, the best place to see how theatres are doing is the Charity Commission since many theatres are charities, they have to report their income and expenditure annually. Companies House is also useful.