Event
Five Foot Broadway Mini Musical in conjunction with Esplanade –Theaters on the Bay as part of Singapore Arts Festival Flipside.

Introduction
Already in its 31st year, Singapore Arts Festival is the largest singular event in the Singapore arts calendar, attracting artists from over 20 countries. Singapore Arts Festival aims to expose audiences to a wide variety of works that are produced internationally as well as locally. This 4-week festival, starting from 23 May to 22 June 2008, with over 500 events and performance around the island, like shopping malls and heartlands attempts to offer arts education and exposure opportunities to make it an integral part of people’s lives in Singapore. From performance and events like the KidsFest, Events Spectacular to Outreach programs that include Arts on the Move, Asian Showcase, Singapore Street Festival and Flipside, Singapore Arts Festival will generate a growing public demand for the arts.

Five Foot Broadway Mini Musical is held in conjunction with the Esplanade as part of Singapore Arts Festival Flipside. Started in 2006, Five Foot Broadway aims to discover, nurture and encourage new talents to create original works of musical theater to serve as a platform to showcase new musical. Five Foot Broadway had attracted a wide diverse of people from newcomers like students, NS man to veterans. It is open to members of the public where they can write in their original works and those selected will be performed in front of a live audience.

Background of Organizer
Five Foot Broadway is organized by Musical Theatre Limited (MTL) in partnership with Esplanade – Theaters on the Bay. Formed in 2003, formerly known as Musical Theater Society, MTL is non-profit organization that is formed to develop the appreciation and creation of new musicals in Singapore. Awarded the Institute of Public Character (IPC) as being beneficial to the community in Singapore, MTL relies on mainly volunteers, who are fueled with passion for musical as well as collaborating with leading performing arts organization. MTL aims to inspire, incubate and express original musical theatre works. At the same time, MTL also run workshops, Heart of Musical, as a form of education to nurture a love of musical in the community. Not only that, MTL also organizes community shows in Community Centers in order to bring musical theater closer to the heartlands

Esplanade – Theaters on the Bay was first open in 12 October 2002. With the vision to be a performing arts center for everyone, the program caters to a diverse audience from kids, youths and adults. With a mission to educate, engage, educate and inspire, Esplanade programs cover all genus ranging from dance, music, visual arts and theater with special emphasis placed on Asian Culture.

Discuss the role of event to the organizer (or attraction/venue)
Five Foot Broadway acts as place marketing for MTL. It creates recognition for MTL as well as attracting the interest of people as it being the first of its kind in Singapore – 6 15-minutes musical written by diverse group of people. It can also attract investors who are interested to invest in the arts scene in Singapore. In a way, it also improves the quality of life, making Singaporeans a more artistically inclined country moving from it notorious image of being rigid and stressful. Not only that, it also serve as an image-maker, creating positive image for MTL as an organization that develop local talents and inspire to develop the local arts scene. Since it is performed in esplanade, it acts as a catalyst stimulating other businesses like the F&B industry and retail industry around esplanade. Five Foot Broadway also serves an animator, making Singapore and MTL a livelier place to live in and it encourages tourist and locals alike to visit. Tourist attraction would also increase as it will attract quality tourist, those who are interested in arts to visit Singapore, If they were impressed with what they have seen, they would be the customer advocates of the musical and spread the demand. Some might even plan their vacation around the event in order to watch it and lengthen their stay in Singapore.

Identify the stakeholders
Stakeholders are people defined as having an interest in the particular event of company. The stakeholders in this event are divided into the media, contributors/ sponsors, host community, participants and spectators, the host organisation and the internal staff.


Media
Media is an important stakeholder in the event. They include Television, Radio and Internet. For this event, they are primarily Arts Central, Gold 90 FM and Yahoo Singapore.

Contributor/ Sponsors
It is important for sponsors to be treated as partners in the event. For this event, they are the Home- Fix, The D.I.Y Store, Super Galvanising Singapore, Courts, Lee Foundation and Samuel Seow Law Corporation.

Host Community
The host community include volunteers being involved in and “owning” the event. These include Singaporeans who volunteer their services in order to make the event a success.

Participant / Spectators
The participants and spectators for whom the event is targeted ultimately base for the success and failures of the event. So, therefore, those who attended Five Foot Broadway are also stakeholders.

Host Organisation
The host organisation can be divided into the government sector and the corporate Sector. The government sector for the Singapore Arts Festival would be the National Arts Council, Creative Community Singapore and the Musical Theater Limited. The corporate sector includes Sing Avenue Production and Arts Fund.

Internal Staff
The internal staff plays a very crucial role in any event. For any event to be a success, the vision and philosophy of the event must be shared by all. The internal staff in Five Foot Broadway includes the cast, the creative team, producer and theater engineer etc.


Identify the target market
The target market for Five Foot Broadway is those who are interested in musicals especially those interested in original works created by locals. They are usually more artistically inclined. The target audience for this musical compromise of young adults aged between 19 – 35 years. Majority (90%) of the audience are locals, while foreigners make up 10% of the numbers.

Critically discuss the marketing strategies employed by the organizer

The product is 6 mini-musicals and the musical experience itself. Packaged as part of Singapore Arts Festival Flipside program, Five Foot Broadway is promoted through Singapore Arts Festival Flipside and Esplanade. The tickets were distributed through SISTIC website, hotline, outlets, esplanade box office and esplanade website. The tickets for Five Foot Broadway were considered the cheapest amongst all other events in the Singapore Arts Festival priced at $25. Students, NSF and senior citizens were given concession price at $20. Information of the tickets was easily available through those following websites. Five Foot Broadway was promoted through various channels like television, Arts Central, internet (Yahoo Singapore) and radio (Gold 90FM). In my opinion, advertising for these shows should have been done on more popular channels. Besides Arts Central and Gold 90FM, it could be promoted in Channel 5 and Power 98 respectively since it appears to be a more popular amongst locals. The musical took place in Esplanade Theater Studio. It was quite a small studio. The event booklet was placed outside the studio near the registration counter. It was not especially visible and audiences watching the show might have missed it easily. The Studio was designed with approximately 250 seats and a runway stage with projected background that beamed lightings occasionally. A small banner “Five Foot Broadway” was tied above the stage. Although the seating were raised, sitting at the last row, I had to crane my neck to see some scene. The atmosphere was warm with laughter radiating every so often. The stage was very close to the audience and it makes the audience connect with the musical and actors/actresses better. The musical lasted for 1h 30 minutes and was divided into 6 15-minutes musical. The musical started with an upbeat musical (Now you see me) that manages to ensnare the audience attention. It also ended with a hilarious musical storyline (Singapore Boys) that audiences can easily identify with. The staffs were very polite and helpful when ushering in through the doors. After the musical ended, the actors and actress were seen to be interacting with some members of the audience and shaking hands with them. Five Foot Broadway partnerships include National Arts Council, Esplanade and Creative Arts Singapore.

How would you rate the organization of the Five Foot Broadway? Why?

The event could be better organized. Marketing of the program was lacking when compared with other programs in the festival, thus it could be overlooked by potential audiences. Promotion of the event could be done through print media, roadshows and public relations with schools as well as internationally. Five Foot Broadway could also be packaged by international travel agencies into their itineraries to increase the repute of the event. Early bird discounts could also be given for those who purchased before a certain date. There was also no merchandise on the musical. There was nothing that the audience could buy as a memento of the musical. The musical itself was excellent. The standard was very professional. The programs lighting and sounds helps to add excitement and special effects in the musical. Five Foot Broadway was very entertaining. Although every musical was only 15 minutes, it manages to deliver a good storyline with the short time. I would definitely watch it again next year.

Potential of the event by the organizer to meet tourist demand

The event has the potential to meet tourist demand. Five Foot Broadway being an original, local musical written, produced and directed by Singaporeans or Permanent Resident would attract tourist who wants to get a taste of Singapore’s local talent. MTL has 5 years of experience of organizing musicals and have so far incubated 22 original musicals. MTL already has strong partnership with government agencies as well and corporations. However, MTL needs to develop its merchandise and packaging and distributions network to include international travel agencies in order to increase the tourist demand first.

Suggest how value of Five Foot Broadway part of Singapore Arts Festival, could be raised to be aligned with the tourism mission of Singapore.

Singapore Tourism Board mission is to “ develop and champion tourism, so as to build the sector into a key driver of economic growth for Singapore”. Singapore Arts Festival could be marketed not only locally as well as internationally to increase its value. In this way, tourists who are attracted in the arts would visit Singapore. Tourists who are here to visit the arts festival would inevitably spend on accommodation, dining, transport and retail. This in turn will bring in the economic growth due to the tourism receipts. Singapore could also create an advertisement similar to the ‘Malaysia Mega Sale’ showing the events and programs to take place and screen it a month before the actual festival to generate and build up interest and hype in the Singapore Arts Festival.

in conjunction with Singapore Arts Festival 2008 Flipside.