What is Broadway Rewards?

[Lucy Harbin]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 2:37pm

Someone in another thread mentioned they were offering free tickets to something, but I've never heard of Broadway Rewards before.

[Scottsacto]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 7:59pm

I believe they are talking about Audience Rewards, run by Telecharge (though some other ticket sites give credits) have gotten alot of points for NYC shows in the past, doesn't seem like as many are giving credits out this year.

https://www.audiencerewards.com/

[bundy5000]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 9:10pm

Personally, I have accumulated at least 50,000 points since
I first started using, But now it is a sham. Out of the 50K I have seen maybe 6-7 shows with additional payments. Having added additional payments takes away the usefulness of the program. Another government take over!

[averagebwaynut]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 11:14pm

If indeed they were referring to Audience Rewards, it is a loyalty program that was set up as a customer loyalty initiative to reward repeat theatrebuyers much the same as an airline or a hotel would reward its regular customers (except it's intended for the theatre industry as a while rather than just one particular brand, like American Airlines or Starwood).

With apologies to Scott, the program is not actually run by Telecharge. It's actually an independent business which was spearheaded by the Nederlander Organization but also has major investment from The Shubert Organization and Jujamcyn Theaters as well as other investors. Furthermore, pretty much every show on Broadway offers the opportunity to earn Audience Rewards points on purchases and/or redeem Audience Rewards points for tickets a) because each of three major theatreowners has now made it a requirement for any show playing in their theatres to participate in Audience Rewards and b) because the ability to enter your Audience Rewards number (just as you would a frequent flier number) has been incorporated into both the Telecharge and Ticketmaster systems.

Also FYI, other than the initial up-front capital (and I guess any deficit financing if the program is not yet making money), it's the shows themselves that subsidize this program. Participation in the program requires shows to pay a small fixed percentage of each ticket purchased by Audience Rewards members using the membership code back to the Audience Rewards program. That percentage differs for different loyalty programs in different industries, but let's say hypothetically that it is a flat 5%. So for example, if an Audience Rewards member buys a $125 ticket and enters his/her membership number, then the show owes Audience Rewards $125 x 5% = $6.25 from that transaction. At the same time, the Audience Rewards member earns points -- often $1 spent = 1 point -- so he/she has earned 125 points.

Points too have a value -- let's say $0.025 per point -- and this is where the redemption side comes in, as well as the business side for Audience Rewards itself.

Using the above example, without the benefit of any special promotion, you would then need 5,000 points to redeem for a "free" $125 ticket (5,000 points x $0.025 = $125). However, if you have 5,000 points (again without the benefit of any special promotions), it means you've spent $5,000 on your Audience Rewards number, which in turn means that shows have paid Audience Rewards 5,000 x 5% = $250. Audience Rewards keeps $125 in an escrow account to cover the cost of your points, for whenever you choose to redeem them (Audience Rewards simply goes and buys the ticket you're redeeming for using the money it has on account for those points), and the balance of $125 is operating capital (and eventually profit) to Audience Rewards.

That is the most basic description of how it works but there are any number of nuances. Audience Rewards can offer bonus points to its member for certain types of transactions (premium ticket purchases, advance sales) for which Audience Rewards gives up a bigger piece of the commission it gets from the show to cover the cost of the member's points earned. Shows too can offer promotions in an effort to stimulate sales -- i.e. "buy our show and get 2x, 3x, or 4x points". All the show is doing, in effect, is paying a higher commission to Audience Rewards to cover the cost of the additional points you the member is earning for the purchase. There are combo possibilities like "get a premium seat location for $125 + 3,000 points" (3,000 is only $75 in the above example so not enough to buy a free ticket but enough to, in effect, buy an "upgrade" like you might on an airline to a ticket that normally might cost $200). A show could even do a "Buy one, get one free for 5,000 points" -- in effect, they would be selling Broadway Rewards 2 tickets for the price of one but it wouldn't "appear" to be a formal discount offered by the show because the customer only knows how many points it cost him/her and not how much Broadway Rewards paid for the ticket (though eventually, that would be known since it would be printed on the ticket itself).

There are many other possibilities, but that's the basic gist...anyway, I hope that made some semblance of sense. Happy to try and answer questions if I can. FYI, I'm not affiliated with the program but a close friend of mine is a former company manager who walked me through all of this when the program first started as the inner workings of this sort of stuff fascinate me. Which is a little scary. :)

[Scottsacto]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 11:32pm

Thanks for all the knowledge on this ABN, but when you call the service line you get a Telecharge Message--so they seem to be contracted out to run the program for Audience Rewards. Sorry I may have given out bad info. on the same call, I was told that Telecharge runs the group sales dept. for ticketmaster for all their Broadway venues.

[averagebwaynut]

Posted: 3/21/10 at 11:46pm

Scott,

Ahhh...now I understand better. I believe your conclusion is still not quite correct, but I understand more clearly how you got there.

What you're describing doesn't actually suggest that runs Audience Rewards but rather that Telecharge -- or more accurately, Broadway Inbound, a subsidiary of Telecharge -- simply administers the ticketbuying portion of the Audience Rewards program. This makes sense on two levels: 1) Broadway Inbound already handles this aspect of the industry for other third-party sites that sell Broadway tickets like Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz, etc, so it follows that they would be contracted to do the same for Audience Rewards and 2) it explains why, to the consumer, this would seem like a Telecharge program.

In fact, though, Broadway Inbound is really only handling that one aspect. The earning of points (which I believe can now also happen via non-theatre programs like Delta SkyMiles and Starwood), tracking of points, tracking of show commissions, bonus promotions, marketing etc etc is all still handled by Audience Rewards itself.