Opera Theatre of Saint Louis
How to make opera come alive before the curtain opens — and long after it falls? For nearly a decade, TOKY has crafted design work for each Opera Theatre of Saint Louis season, developing distinct, evocative identities for each dramatic show.
TOKY is also the firm behind the organization’s website — a critical resource that’s helped Opera Theatre of Saint Louis achieve significant ticket-sale increases in recent years.
Our terrific partnership with the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis began in 2005. After very quickly increasing ticket sales through an imaginative new advertising campaign, TOKY turned to larger brand work for the organization. OTSL was renowned for adventurous productions and numerous world and American premieres, but the organization needed to refresh its brand personality and broaden its audience.
TOKY knew that all materials showcasing this remarkable opera had to be equally extraordinary, and the tone pitch-perfect. We began a process that has continued successfully to this day: Creating captivating, dramatic, custom-illustrated icons for each production, and casting them in a full series of ads, print collateral, signage, and invitations to enhance brand awareness and further increase ticket sales.
TOKY was also tasked with relaunching the OTSL website, transitioning them from an unwieldy, difficult-to-update system to our own flexible Eero CMS, which integrates seamlessly with the Tessitura ticketing software.
While we are heartened by the design-industry recognition our OTSL work receives — our production designs, season brochures, and gala invitations earn widespread kudos — we are especially gratified when numbers play a clear role in the success story: During the recent 2012 season, OTSL reported that first-day single-ticket sales for 2012 were up 58 percent from 2011 and 50 percent from 2010.
“TOKY’s award-winning work for Opera Theatre has helped distinguish our company’s visual style in ways that broaden our appeal and speak to our most important values: quality, inventiveness, approachability, sophistication, and fun. Working with TOKY means that they are not satisfied until we are satisfied — as a firm and as individuals they are enormously generous with their time and their tremendous talent.”
Timothy O’Leary, General Director, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis