Today was a good day on many levels.

I got to sleep in a little because I was going to a meeting of my booking consortium in town so driving in to the office only to have to turn around and drive back an hour later didn’t make sense.

The consortium meeting was essentially called to provide an opportunity for those who aren’t attending the Western Arts Alliance Conference next month to discuss what types of groups they would like those of us who are attending to watch for.

Many of the attendees at the meeting brought along season brochures for their upcoming season and passed them around proudly. (Including me!) Since many of us are hosting the same performers, it was interesting to see each organization’s interpretation of the same artist.

Ironically, as Mr. Budget, I was looking at the interpretation first. I brought a couple copies of the other brochures back to my graphic designer and her first observation was about the amount of money the other places must have to afford such extravagant brochures.

I honestly thought her simpler design was much more powerful than the more expensive pieces. You get it in the mail, you open the first fold and BAM! the image there is so captivating you want to pay attention to the rest of the information.

The funny thing is, I gave her the same budget as last year. Then I purposely wrote less in my letter to patrons and in the descriptions so that there was more room for images and white space.

She comes back with a design on a much smaller space than last year and I ended up having to cut more text!

On the other hand, it cost about $1,500 less than last year so I edited quite happily.

One of the women at the meeting thanked me for suggesting they put a sampling of the music artists would be playing on their website. (Actually, inspired by Andrew Taylor’s post, I had suggested using iTunes to supplement a season brochure, but I will take the gratitude anyway. Unfortunately, her site is a little rough and it is tough to find the links.)

Next good thing was that I really wanted to suggest bringing a performer from last season back next season. I am still getting comments about how good he was, my radio ad rep keeps muttering about his disappointment over missing the performance and it is the artist’s 40 anniversary season.

But I fear it might be too soon to bring him back.

Fortunately, I don’t have to say a thing. One of my other partners mentions the same thing, I offer some supportive comments and while it isn’t a done deal, it wasn’t a hard sell at all to get the ball rolling.

Then when I get back to the office, I get an email from an agent saying he believes the group he represents would be happy to attend a reception thrown for them by adoring fans. This is great because not only will the fans be happy, but it will help me promote the show. (Though honestly, it is already selling so well we could be sold out before they even start their national tour.)

The last good thing was sort of a mixed blessing. We had scheduled the meeting for 4 hours but only took 1.5 hours to finish our business. Unfortunately, thinking I wouldn’t be back for 3 hours more, my staff moved cabinets and desks into my office so they could clean where they had sat. It was a little hard getting to my desk to say the least.

All in all though, a good day.