While on a tear through London theatre in March 2012, I was invited by Nancy Groves, editor of Guardian Culture Professionals, to begin contributing pieces to the wealth of resources created and curated by that online community resource, operated under under the aegis of London’s Guardian newspaper. Since I am no expert in the British arts management scene, my focus for this (and subsequent pieces) is in where our practices may differ. First up was the issue of corporate sponsorship, at a time when the U.S. system was being held up by the British government as a paragon — just as major cuts were coming to bear on the Arts Council of England. Because the headline and sub-head were a bit broader than the piece itself, I’ve posted it here under my original title, but you can see the online version here.

As worldwide economic troubles continue to take their toll, it’s inevitable that the arts have become victims by afterthought. Expressions of support from our governments are undermined by cost-cutting measures that are often minimal in the grand scheme of national belt-tightening, but significant within our field (and indeed, that of other not-for-profit and charitable organisations).

Even as British arts groups are being told to look to the American system of sponsorship to make up for drastic cuts in funding from the Arts Council, both our governments are seeking to reduce tax incentives for charitable donations, a contradictory message – and tough times aren’t exactly the right time to initiate new sponsorships and new giving traditions where none may have existed before.

Corporate giving in the US was once primarily an altruistic act, which also yielded public relations goodwill for the donor. The recipient organisations benefited not only from new funds, but from the legitimising association with solid corporate citizens – companies like Mobil and AT&T, to name but two, saw the benefit of supporting cultural efforts on stages and subsidised television.

If you were fortunate enough to work in a community where a major corporation was based (I spent many years in Hartford, home to United Technologies), there was also enlightened corporate giving, and the question was rarely ‘if’ one would receive support, but only what initiative might be funded.

Corporations recognised that it was essential to contribute to their communities beyond just providing jobs; it was smart business for them to ensure quality of life issues as well.

As shareholder returns have become ever more paramount and as the economy has changed, so has a great deal of corporate thinking. While not absolute (and I’m no longer speaking of specific companies here), corporate giving has shifted, with many companies moving their philanthropic efforts away from enlightened giving and into the realm of marketing.

Once ensconced in marketing offices, the language of corporate “giving” has changed from one of charity to one of reciprocity. How many impressions will the company receive for each marketing dollar provided, what is the national (or even local) profile of the organisation, and what is the overall “bang for the buck”? The relationship has become, in so many cases, transactional.

I recall past generosity across the country from a major airline, which essentially sought to “own” the cultural sector through support to major arts organisations nationally, and I watched it descend into dollar-for-dollar trades of flight miles for “exposure.”

One major financial company supported the efforts of an organisation I worked at primarily to ensure that a competitor couldn’t do so, but as the competitor became less determined to dominate theatre, the support for my organisation became more difficult to secure, and ultimately vanished.

Apart from funds alone, modern sponsorship can be predicated on opportunities for corporate entertainment. In-demand, prestigious organisations benefit here, because the association is then markedly more desirable; access to hard-to-get tickets becomes part of the calculation. Once again, there are dollar figures attached, but if your organisation’s tickets are limited, corporations will place a premium value on those tickets as part of what they receive for their sponsorship.

Although it’s seemingly contrary, sheer volume of audience is also desirable, since that ensures the highest number of impressions from a visibly acknowledged sponsorship on and off-site (the more seats to sell, the more off-site advertising that may carry a corporate logo by way of “thanks” as well as more people walking by on-site branded banners acknowledging underwriting).

It’s worth noting, however, that seats provided under sponsorship, unless the volume is enormous (which is only possible for large organisations), rarely reach the company’s employees; they are in turn used for the entertainment of current or potential business associates, or even bartered away in other promotional deals.

Of course to some companies the arts continue to offer one thing that other marketing opportunities – and you’ll note I am no longer speaking of donations or sponsorship – do not, and that can be access to celebrities. If you are an organisation with high profile artists on stage, behind the scenes or in leadership positions, you have an asset that is much harder to quantify but much desired.

From “grip and grin” photo ops to intimate dinners where a celebrity will publicly thank a company for support, fame can provide an incentive that can make or break sponsorship efforts. Can you imagine anyone saying no to request for a meeting from, say, Dame Judi Dench? Does it become easier to recruit trustees with strong corporate credentials to your governance boards if they think they’ll be at meetings with Jude Law? You need only to look at the success of The Old Vic under Kevin Spacey, a master fundraiser (among his many skills), to see how the scales can be tipped.

Does this paint a pessimistic picture of sponsorship as a substitute for diminished Arts Council funding? Yes, especially for smaller groups outside of major metropolitan centres. That’s not to say that genuine corporate philanthropy has been extinguished or that a case cannot be made for the intangible value to a corporation of arts support.

Yet, when any but the largest arts organisations are competing with, say, the massive appeal of sporting events (the Olympics, anyone?) it is naive or even callous to suggest that corporations will simply step in to fill a precipitous funding gap.

Access, cultivation, negotiation – these all take time, and with few exceptions corporate arts funding in America doesn’t approach the percentage of support British groups have been receiving via ACE. Indeed, many British arts organisations may need to build up their fundraising staffs prospectively in order to exploit these specific avenues.

Like foundation and trust support (which remain truly charitable) the level of one-to-one corporate outreach is much greater than a broad-based annual appeal to your audience, although a single “yes” from a corporation can result in funds that might equal or exceed hundreds of individual donors in a sole success.

But the returns may be slow in coming, since it’s unlikely there are companies with unspent marketing funds just awaiting an entreaty from the arts – and the arts must make their voices heard among countless other charitable causes, all victims of the same climate of contraction.