American Shakespeare Center

In the long term, ASC aims to undergo transformational growth in order to fully realize our potential as Shakespeare's American Home, and eventually build a re-creation of the Globe Theatre as it was rebuilt in 1614.

To succeed, we must refine and enhance a sustainable infrastructure as well as expand earned and contributed revenue to invest in the organization's people and mission-centric programming and prepare for transformational growth.

In 2015 ASC developed a comprehensive five-year Strategic Plan to address these long term priorities. In the Strategic Plan we lay out the following goals:

1) Create fundraising that drives the transformational expansion of the American Shakespeare Center, Shakespeare's American home.

2) Be an international beacon for people of all backgrounds to experience the joy and accessibility of Shakespeare.

3) Make Shakespeare's American Home a center whose people ensure its excellence.

4) Expand our premier position in the world of theatre and education through programming excellence and our ongoing commitment to Shakespeare's staging conditions.

The strategies associated with each of these goals are as follows:

Goal: Create fundraising that drives the transformational expansion of the American Shakespeare Center, Shakespeare's American home.

Strategies:
• Develop and implement a transformational funding plan to support fully transformational project(s) within this strategic planning period.
• Develop and implement a plan for resource development to increase contributed income to $1.25M by the end of FY20.
• Increase board leadership and engagement in achieving the funding goal of the ASC.
• Grow earned revenue by $1M over FY14 by the end of FY20.

Goal: Be an international beacon for people of all backgrounds to experience the joy and accessibility of Shakespeare.

Strategies:
• Define, build, and deploy the brand of the American Shakespeare Center in regional, national, and international settings.
• Build and strengthen strategic partnerships with Mary Baldwin College and other local, national, and international governmental, educational, and cultural institutions.
• Discover and recruit new audiences resulting in a 15% increase in attendance in FY20 over FY14.
• Retain and develop current audiences resulting in an increase in returning patrons by 500 households for FY20 over FY14.
• Serve 80% repeat Touring venues and 20% new venues by end of FY20 (2020/21 tour).
• Target special populations with inclusive Education programming with four events per year and grow retention to a minimum of 40% of repeat customers across all programming by FY20.

Goal: Make Shakespeare's American Home a center whose people ensure its excellence.

Strategies:
• Develop and manage a corporate structure that attracts, retains, and inspires talented performers, educators, administrators, and employees.
• Create and implement a leadership succession plan.
• Define and implement structure for the Board that best helps the organization achieve its goals

Goal: Expand our premier position in the world of theatre and education through programming excellence and our ongoing commitment to Shakespeare's staging conditions.

Strategies:
• Map the future of ASC's leading edge programming and build the infrastructure to support it.
• Create high-quality, accessible, new performances, educational programming, and transformational projects inside and outside of Shakespeare and his contemporaries that take advantage of Shakespeare's staging conditions.
• Improve and maintain infrastructure to support Shakespeare's staging conditions.

Our capabilities are varied and numerous, and include the following:

- a committed Board of Directors to lead us through this period of growth;

- expanded, experienced staff capacity to support new activities;

- the support of the Staunton/Augusta/Waynesboro community we call home;

- dedicated fans, donors, and institutional funders; and

- regular grants from the Virginia Commission for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and other state and federal partners.

Over the course of our 28 year history, we have accomplished so much: built the Blackfriars Playhouse in 2001, toured across the country and around the world, developed the one-of-a-kind Actors' Renaissance Season, more than doubled tourism spending in Staunton over the first 14 years of the Playhouse, expanded the breadth and depth of Shakespeare Study Guides available to educators, improved and enhanced educational programs...and more.

We have expanded our team to include 50+ talented artists, educators, and administrators, but must continue our work to develop and manage a corporate structure that attracts, retains, and inspires such individuals. For example, we have not yet reached our goal of paying all actors, regardless of union status, the minimum salary required by union contracts.

We have not yet built a re-creation of the Globe Theatre in America; and we have not yet built a platform for modern, living playwrights to explore large cast, bold, expansive plays on our stage, using our staging conditions.

We are inspired and dedicated to achieving these and many other goals to expand the reach and impact of our mission.