Cobb Energy Centre exceeds first-year expectations

Michael Taormina predicted that maybe 90,000 show-goers would pass through the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre’s chandeliered lobby during its first year in business.

Instead, 225,000 patrons will have taken in the opera, Sinbad’s comedy or Kelly Clarkson’s songs.

Bob Andres / bandres@ajc.com

The Cobb Energy Centre opened a year ago, and its first year has exceeded most expectations

Anniversary celebration
The public is invited to celebrate the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre's one-year anniversary this weekend. On Saturday, an "overture gala," with cocktails, dinner and The Original Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons will be held. Free tours and "vignette" performances will be offered Sunday. 2800 Cobb Galleria Parkway, Atlanta. Call 770-916-2800 for more information. Performances and times Sunday:

• Atlanta Ballet – 11:30 a.m.
• Synchronicity – Noon
• Ruth Mitchell Dance – 12:30 p.m.
• Young Audiences, Woodruff Arts Center – 1 p.m.
• Georgia Ballet – 1:30 p.m.
• The Atlanta Opera – 2:30 p.m.
• Cobb Wind Symphony – 3:30 p.m.

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Taormina, the Centre’s managing director, expected the venue across from the Cobb Galleria Centre to host as many as 84 events. Wrong again: the Centre expects 118 events by the fiscal year’s end later this month.

And, even in a down economy, revenues already are running a half-million dollars beyond what was projected.

“We’ve exceeded expectations,” Taormina said earlier this week. “We’re recognized as a state-of-the-art venue. And we’ve accomplished all that on budget and on time.”

The Cobb Centre celebrates its first birthday this weekend with a Frankie Valli-featured fundraiser Saturday and free events Sunday.

Doubts that suburbia – the venue sits at the intersection of Interstates 75 and 285 – would support the arts have been allayed. With Atlanta’s opera and ballet companies, as well as a popular Broadway theater series, now calling Cobb home, the Centre’s reputation as an arts enclave grows.

First-year successes, though, will be hard to repeat. Cobb officials worry that the Centre’s novelty will wear off. A recession too might keep patrons away from the $145 million Centre’s main stage. Others fret that a budget-conscious Centre might stick with the financially safe – Jeff Foxworthy, anybody? – rather than expand cultural horizons.

“There is tremendous economic pressure on these buildings and that may manifest itself by taking less risks with their programming,” said Duncan Webb, a management consultant for performing arts facilities. “Congratulations on [Cobb’s] progress to date, but the second year may be more of a challenge than the first year.”

Solid financing

Cobb County, along with deep-pocketed corporate and private sponsors, financed most of the Centre’s $145 million construction. The county backed $57 million in bonds; the authority that owns and operates the Centre put up $36 million. Cobb Energy, the for-profit utility in Marietta, paid $20 million for naming rights. Developer John A. Williams plopped down $10 million and his name graces the 2,750-seat theater.

Michele Swann, general manager of the Cobb-Marietta Coliseum and Exhibit Hall Authority, said 97 percent of the $145 million has been pledged so far.

The Centre opened Sept. 15, 2007. The trick, since, has been to make money and pay off the non-profit’s debt. The Authority acts largely as a building manager, renting the theater to promoters who bring in shows and sell tickets. It’s a common and conservative approach for performing arts venues. The Centre also makes money renting the ballroom for corporate gatherings, bar mitzvahs and other events. The $5 parking fee helps too.

The Atlanta transplants – the opera, ballet and Broadway Series – generate more than half of the Centre’s revenue.

“The resident companies are the key to success of any venue or stadium,” Taormina said. “They’re like office tenants. You need a lead tenant you can build a base upon.”

Taormina, along with representatives from the ballet, opera, Fox Theatre and the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau, downplay the resident companies’ flight from downtown. The Atlanta Opera, for example, quit the clunky Boisfeuillet Jones Atlanta Civic Center in May 2007.

“I was really glad to get the hell out of there,” said opera-buff Jack Murphy who waited outside the Centre’s box office earlier this week to buy tickets for Madama Butterfly. “Here, you sit right up next to the stage. The acoustics are fine. And it’s pretty convenient getting out here.”

Atlanta Opera’s attendance rose 67 percent in the new digs. The financially strapped Atlanta Ballet reports that subscriptions — tickets to multiple performances – are up 12 percent for the upcoming season, which begins October 23 with Swan Lake.

“One of the challenges with our schedule at the Fox Theater was that we couldn’t get the weeks we needed because of its programming,” said Barry Hughson, the troupe’s executive director. “As a resident company in Cobb, we’ll be able to capture the dates we need to grow.”

At 4,678 seats, the Fox was too big for the ballet. Ditto the Civic Center (4,600 seats) and the opera. Kris Delaney, marketing director for the Fox, said the ballet’s leave-taking “gives us more flexibility when speaking with promoters.”

“We really fit two different niches in the entertainment market in Atlanta,” she said, adding that the Fox expects to continue booking shows 300 nights every year. “We wish them well. We’re really very happy for Cobb.”

National recognition

The Cobb Centre garners national acclaim – Billboard magazine, for example, lauds the venue as one of the top five performing arts centers with less than 10,000 seats — for first-year success. Not so for Miami’s Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, the poster child for how-not-to-open a cultural center.

Webb, the consultant, labels Arsht’s inaugural year “a big disaster.” Opened in fall 2006, the Center ran up a first-year deficit of $2.5 million.

The Cobb Centre, by comparison, tallies $4.8 million in revenues for the first 10 months of the fiscal year – 11 percent above what was projected. Center profits, as well as the county’s hotel-motel tax collections, ensure that all debts are being paid off.

“The first year has been an overwhelming success,” boasted Swann, the authority’s general manager.

Now, though, it’s time for the encore – in a souring economy.

“As long as we keep tracking on bookings, which we are, we will ride this out,” Taormina said.