ReWork Consulting, a leading ticketing consultancy which works to help support thriving leisure, attractions, and experience sectors with the best ticketing and technology partnerships, has been working with Lakeland Arts to find a ticketing solution to meet the organisation’s varied requirements.
From theme parks to museums, and activity centres to live entertainment, ReWork supports organisations by identifying the best tickets and booking partners for their needs. Its clients have included Merlin Entertainments, Wake the Tiger, the Lost Gardens of Heligan, and LIVE IT. The consultancy provides services to both operators and suppliers informed by industry insight, market knowledge, and expertise.
Lakeland Arts partnered with ReWork on its ticketing strategy to improve the cost-effectiveness of its ticketing solution. As a small charitable organisation in the Lake District, the largest National Park in the UK, Lakeland Arts faces a vast range of ticketing, retail and membership challenges. Although the organisation is small, it manages four art and social history museums. Located both on land and on water, all of these attractions vary in their offering and audience and have very different technology requirements.
The organisation approached ReWork with the question – is there a ticketing, membership and retail solution that meets these complex requirements, akin to some of the biggest attractions, for a charity with a smaller budget for technology?
Procurement expertise
To address this question, ReWork drew on its knowledge of the attractions ticketing market, which currently stands at over 25 different suppliers supporting the UK sector. Together with the firm’s procurement expertise, the consultancy was able to provide Lakeland Arts with the support needed to run its ticketing project effectively and successfully.
Lea Garrett Hampson, head of marketing and communications at Lakeland Arts, explains: “Having multiple attractions is rare, if not completely unique, for small cultural organisations. As a result, finding products on the market to fully fit our complex but smaller-scale needs was a huge challenge.
“ReWork advised on and supported the procurement process and our decision-making by presenting a variety of options of suppliers and their platforms, so we could weigh up to see what was right for us.”
Sarah Bagg, founder ReWork Consulting, says: “ReWork supports projects with all types of attractions, leisure, and experience operators, as well as tech suppliers. We help large global organisations, smaller publicly funded and everything in between.”
“Although there are key differences, there’s more in common than you may think, especially when it comes to procurement. Whether you have an in-house procurement resource or are wearing multiple hats that include procuring systems, a lack of specific platform/partner market knowledge, as well as procurement best practices are common themes. This is where ReWork’s experience and knowledge come in.”
Improved booking experience
In addition to the technical and budgetary constraints, this project also needed to meet a challenging timeframe. Through its extensive experience, ReWork has streamlined processes that are often found within procurement projects to improve on many historic practices.
Bagg explains: “ReWork was able to further streamline and rework this particular procurement project to meet the extremely tight timeframes, without losing vital steps that ensured the selection process covered essential points.
“Due to technical, commercial and procurement experiences we’ve had as an operator, we were able to ensure the objectives for this project were in line with the organisation’s goals as well as realistic in today’s tech market and within budget restraints. Without this 360-degree experience and extensive knowledge of the ticketing/EPOS/CRM market, this would not have been possible.
“ReWork worked with the vendors to ensure they could successfully respond to the brief,
present/demo so Lakeland Arts had full clarity of services/platform capabilities, and therefore reduced ambiguity around requirements.”
The new ticketing solution has enabled Lakeland Arts to improve its online customer booking experience, to include an intuitive new user interface. It also provides greatly improved integrated online and on-site membership functionality.
Garrett Hampson says: “Our challenge was primarily financial. As a small charitable organisation, we were paying a premium to have access to a system more complex than our needs. Simplifying has allowed us to save on costs and offer a more straightforward user experience online, as well as in-person experiences.”
In addition, the organisation will benefit from features that offer more flexibility, better customer engagement and enhanced return on investment. These include rules-based pricing, gift vouchers, pre-visit communications, and a fully integrated EPOS and stock management solution for all of the charity’s shops and cafes.
Following the success of the ticketing project, Lakeland Arts is now working to integrate its CRM, which will support its fundraising. The charity will also continue to partner with ReWork, which will provide consultative support to ensure that the ticketing solution results in a positive ROI.
Supporting the sector
ReWork Consulting initially offered its technology, ticketing, EPOS and CRM procurement services to the attractions industry, and is now expanding into the wider leisure and experience sectors.
In addition, the firm now provides services to technology providers, which range from ticketing market review, development roadmap planning, and product placement and launch/re-launch strategy, to marketing strategy and implementation, sales conversion strategy, product demonstration conversion, and much more.
“By supporting both parts of the sector we aim to do what we can to raise standards and help the industry improve – whilst creating individual success for the organisations we work with,” says Bagg.
Bagg has also founded a women in tech support network. She explains: “I’m very proud of the work I have done by starting the women in tech support network. It’s only small, but I believe these steps matter if we’re going to have a greater presence and voice within the industry.
“Personally, I find it disappointing when you hear that women are being asked to chair/moderate/be part of a panel purely to equal the female/male ratio, rather than simply wanting to hear from those women. This network started off the back of a couple of conversations at the Ticketing Professionals Conference with Rachael Easton and Kate Mroczkowsk, it’s these small initiatives that in time I believe will make a difference.”
Over the coming months, ReWork will be at several key trade events including Intix from 29 Jan to 1 Feb, Arival Berlin from 2 to 4 March where Bagg will moderate two sessions, the Ticketing Professionals Conference from 20 to 22 March where Bagg is in an education panel and a moderator, and Association for Cultural Enterprise from 13 to 14 March.
Last year, ReWork Consulting was brought in to help Wake the Tiger, a unique immersive attraction in Bristol, UK, find the right ticketing, EPOS and CRM partner to support the immersive experience’s continued growth. ReWork provides free insight, advice and thought leadership through their regular articles, find out more here.
