Run It Like a Business: Strategies for Arts Organizations to Increase Audiences, Remain Relevant, and Multiply Money

Featured on Publishers Weekly 2024 Announcement Issue

TEDx speaker Aubrey Bergauer—“the Steve Jobs of classical music”—reveals how to run a successful arts business in the post-pandemic era, adapting for-profit methods for not-for-profit goals.

In the US alone, the arts are a $763 billion sector whose 100,000+ organizations serve almost every community in the nation. There’s no reason arts organizations should struggle to make ends meet. And now, with arts-tested strategies from Aubrey Bergauer, they won’t. This foolproof guide shows how to reach new levels of engagement—while always putting art first.

Running your arts organization like a business is your path forward to:
• Grow audiences and keep them coming back again
• Make our organizations more inclusive
• Get younger attendees in the seats and on the donor rolls
• Generate millions more dollars in revenue
• Continue to create the art we love—without the stress of figuring out how to afford it

Just because arts organizations are non-profits doesn’t mean they shouldn’t make money; it means the money they make goes back to fund the mission—whether that’s music, visual arts, theatre, dance, or one of many other mediums that enrich our lives.

The for-profit world knows how to achieve success across customer engagement, user experience, company culture, the subscription economy, technology and media, new revenue streams, and brand relevance. Run It Like a Business provides a powerful, proven framework to help all arts organizations revitalize their economic engines and ultimately serve the arts and its patrons.