Welcome to the first quarterly of IAVM’s Business Barometer, a new product from VenueDataSource.
Launched in April 2013, Business Barometer is a tool to help IAVM members monitor current and future business conditions and provide early identification of trends that can create opportunities or provide advance warning of an impending storm. IAVM recruited a panel of 250 venue managers to take part in this initiative. All panel members agreed to participate in short, quarterly surveys that ask questions related to current business conditions compared to last year, and their professional outlook for next year. IAVM developed the survey questions with input from its Research Advisory Council, the IAVM research manager, and other internal management staff.
In this first quarterly, venues across the industry are seeing increases in attendance and revenue over the year prior—and the outlook for the coming year is even better. More than two-thirds of professionals across sectors (64 percent) say that overall business conditions are better than 2013. Next year? Eighty percent see a healthier future.
Anecdotally, for those citing the greatest influx of business, touring acts and the types of events may have improved since last year, which means better ticket and merchandise sales—and higher prices—for some and more exhibit hall space booked for others.
Consider this when looking at the marketplace environment overall: 18 percent of venues report worse business conditions than last year—but only 5 percent see that continuing into the next.
Please read the Business Barometer to learn more about venue industry business conditions.
