About Creative Grounds Fine Arts Academy

Creative Grounds Fine Arts Academy (Creative Grounds) was founded by Mark and Katie Landis to serve the Indianapolis metro area through youth theatre. Creative Grounds brings together children aged 7-18, producing three to four heartwarming musical productions each semester. Each production showcases 200-250 talented young performers, and draws over 1,000 audience members across weekend performances. We’re thrilled to share their story with you!

The Challenge

Although Creative Grounds was excelling in its productions, they were struggling to maintain strong engagement with past patrons. Without a sustainable way to stay connected between shows, it became difficult to ensure continued interest and excitement from their audience. The academy needed an affordable solution that could help them keep their community engaged and streamline their marketing efforts.

Partnering with On The Stage

On The Stage (OTS) provided Creative Grounds with the tools and resources to enhance their audience engagement and improve ticket sales. Through OTS’s marketing platform, Creative Grounds was able to automate their email campaigns and integrate social media strategies to reach past patrons and attract new audience members. Additionally, OTS allowed them to create professional, Broadway-style show sites and even launch merchandise offerings—all with minimal effort and cost.

The Outcome

Since partnering with OTS,  Creative Grounds has experienced several key improvements:

  • Increase ticket sales by 12% in just one year
  • Drive 15.5% of ticket orders and revenue through streamlined, automated email campaigns 
  • Expand their patron database by 45.7%, adding 3,026 new contacts since joining OTS
  • Strengthen relationships with past patrons and attract new audience members from outside their immediate cast and crew families
  • Create professional, Broadway-style show sites and merchandise with ease

As a result, Creative Grounds has been able to connect with their community more effectively, and their productions are now more widely attended, even by those with no direct ties to the cast and crew.

“When you do the research on all of the solutions out there, On The Stage is the most personable with comparable rates and their customer support is unmatched.“

Mark Landis, Executive Director and Co-Founder

About On The Stage

On The Stage (OTS), founded by Tony Award-winning producer Hunter Arnold, empowers performing arts organizations to reach their full potential. With a comprehensive suite of tools—from ticket sales to marketing automation—OTS is designed to help theatres like CGFAA grow and thrive.

OTS offers Broadway-caliber tools designed to make running your theatre easier, more efficient, and even a bit fun. We’re here to help you:

  • Make it easy for patrons to purchase tickets through a robust ticketing system that offers a seamless experience optimized for mobile devices
  • Create additional revenue streams without increasing ticket prices through custom fees, non-ticket add-ons, merchandise, fundraising, offers, and upgrades
  • Target your patrons like a pro with built-in audience segmentation, filtered booking flows, and patron relationship management tools that include custom fields and integrations with MailChimp, Google Analytics, and Meta Pixel
  • Leverage best-in-class marketing and promotional tools across social, digital, email, print, and traditional channels that are built on unparalleled industry expertise
  • Expand your reach with streaming and video-on-demand performance options

Ready to see how it works? Book a personalized demo to discover how On The Stage can help your theatre thrive.

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