Use this link to share with your colleagues:
How to Set Up a Fixed Subscription: https://help.pm.leapevent.tech/a/863506
This article will walk you through the basics of building a Fixed subscription. As is suggested by the name, this type of subscription gives your patrons a package consisting of a specific set of pre-defined Event Instances.
We'll show you how to:
- Map out your season and packages
- Build out your season
- Build your subscription framework
- Build the subscription packages
- Take a step to help with renewals next year
Ready? Let's jump in!
First, define your packages and pricing
We can't build anything until we know exactly what it will entail, right down to the nitty-gritty details. You may want to start this process on paper, or in a spreadsheet; whatever makes sense to you.
1. Map out your season and your packages
We're diving deep into box office management in this article; go here if you need to brush up on your options when it comes to Ticketable Events and Event Instances. An understanding of how those two objects work is key to building subscription packages.
You can't build your fixed subscription packages unless you know what you're selling. So start by gathering the following:
- The productions in your upcoming season, with their performance dates and times
- What subscription options you'll be selling, along with...
- What shows are included in those options
- What packages (i.e. bundles of dates) you'll be providing your patrons
- The price points for your subscription packages
- The price points for your single tickets
In this article, we're specifically looking at fixed subscriptions, meaning that patrons don't have a choice in what shows are included in their packages, and usually attend on the same day across several shows (i.e. they attend on the First Thursday).
If you're looking to create a Choose Your Own subscription, read here.
If you're looking to create a Pick Later (i.e. flex pass or voucher subscription), read here.
Unsure what we mean when we refer to these three different subscription models, and what type you need to set up? Read here.
2. And now for some math!
In PatronManager, the total cost of the subscription is the sum of all of the price levels in the subscription.
This means that you should divide the total cost of your subscription by the number of events in that subscription, and the resulting number should be the cost of your subscription price levels. Sometimes the numbers won't divide evenly, in which case you can make the individual event price levels slightly different from one another.
In this example, we want the subscription to cost $250. The customer can choose three events with this package. Three does not divide evenly into 250, so two of these price levels are going to be $83, and one is going to be $84.
To do: figure out the cost of your subscription price levels using our Best Practices: Subscription Math article.
For Fixed subscriptions, you can slightly vary the price of tickets across the different Events that make up the package, in order to arrive at the correct total cost. You'll want to decide which Event (or Events) will have different pricing, and map out the specific price for each Event.
Now build out your retail Events
Before we can build a subscription package, we need to build all the pieces that will make it up. You can think of your subscription Event as a nice fancy envelope, and the retail Events as the tickets you'll put into that envelope.
It's time to build out your season Events and Instances, along with the subscription Price Levels you'll need for each one - you can think of this step like assembling all the tickets you want to sell in these packages.
If you've already built the shows of your season in PatronManager, skip ahead to create your subscription Price Levels as described in step 3.2 below.
1. Create a new Ticketable Event and fill in the details
It's time to set up a single Event that will be the first show in your season and subscription package.
Set up one Ticketable Event, and one Event Instance within that Event, for the first show in your upcoming season that will be part of your Fixed subscription package.
Do you need to brush up on building events? Here you go:
How to Create a New General Admission or Reserved Seating Event
Be sure to build *new* or *newly cloned* Events each season, rather than re-using last season's Events. If you don't start with new Events, you may encounter problems with exchanges and reporting later on.
2. Double check the Allocations that were automatically created
When you select the Venue on the Event Instance, it automatically has a set of Allocations that are created for your event. Rename them and/or reallocate them if they aren't correct.
3. Create your single ticket and subscription Price Levels
You'll create both your single ticket Price Levels and the set of subscription Price Levels that you'll use a bit later to build your subscription packages. Here are specifics on creating those subscription Price Levels:
3.1. Set the Visibility for the subscription Price Levels to "Subscription"
3.2. Create a subscription Price Level for each package you offer
If you offer multiple subscription prices/packages for the same Allocation (such as Adult vs Student, or Fixed vs Choose Your Own), create as many subscription Price Levels as you need to make up each subscription pricing option.
3.3. Create subscription Price Levels in every Allocation you sell as a subscription package
By this, we mean that you sell a subscription package at one price point in the premium orchestra, and another price point in the orchestra. You would create subscription Price Levels on both the premium orchestra and regular orchestra Allocations.
4. Clone the completed Event Instance as needed
Once you have your first Event Instance set up to your liking with both single ticket and subscription Price Levels and correct Allocations, clone the Event Instance until you have as many Instances (i.e. performances) as you need for that particular Ticketable Event.
5. Clone the Ticketable Event along with Instances to build out the rest of your season
Got your first full Ticketable Event set up? Great! Now, clone it and edit the details (and delete or add Event Instances, as well as adjusting names and dates for each) to build the rest of the shows in your upcoming season.
6. Adjust Price Levels if necessary
Do you have one Ticketable Event where the subscription Price Levels need to have different prices? This could be because either:
- Your subscription math works out such that one Ticketable Event needs slightly different prices for an even package price
- One show should be more/less expensive than the rest, since the single tickets of that show are also priced differently
Because you already mapped out your season, you know exactly which Event and Instances you need to adjust!
Be sure to update the relevant subscription Price Levels for each Event Instance in the differently-priced Ticketable Event. In the screenshot below, you can see we've changed the price of both our Regular and Student/Senior Subs.
Nice job! Now it's time to build the framework for your subscription packages
Once your single ticket Event Instances are set up with the Price Levels that will make up your subscription packages, you can build the packages themselves. Think of this like printing the envelopes which will hold all those subscription tickets.
1. Go to the Event Inventory tab and click "New Ticketable Event"
2. Name your subscription, change the Type to "Subscription" and click "Save"
This is the top-level grouping for the set of subscription packages you'll sell within this Event.
Q: How should we organize subscription packages?
A: This is a great question, and there are several things to consider in making this decision, from reporting to display on the Public Ticketing Site. For a complete overview and demo, check out this recorded webinar on Subscription Package Best Practices.
We typically recommend a single subscription Ticketable Event if you have a limited number of subscription packages, each with similar marketing and perks. In that case, your subscription Event would be called something like "2025 Subscriptions".
If you have a wide variety of packages and/or if the marketing and perks vary between them, it can be easier to communicate the differences to patrons by grouping them into separate subscription Ticketable Events. In that case, your subscription Events might have names like "2025 Fixed Subscriptions" and "2025 Choose Your Own Subscriptions".
We recommend you set up your Subscription Event Inventory as follows:
-
Ticketable Event: the year of your subscriptions, or a subset of the type of subscription for that year
- e.g. "2025 Subscriptions" or "2025 Fixed Subscriptions"
-
Event Instance: each subscription package you plan to sell
- e.g. "First Fridays", "Fixed 6-show Package", "Pick 3", etc.
-
Allocations: create Allocations to mirror the sections in your single ticket Event Instances (the Event Instances that make up your season)
- e.g. "Premium Balcony", "Mezzanine", etc. or "Tier 1", "Tier 2", etc
-
Price Level: if you're selling different price points for subscription packages in the same Allocation, detail those
- e.g. "Adult Subscription", "Senior/Student Subscription", etc.
Want patrons who buy this subscription to automatically receive a subscriber badge? Set the "Subscriber Badge" picklist to "Current"!
You can change this value at any point, and badges for your patrons will automatically update the following day.
3. Scroll down to the bottom section and click "New"
4. Name the Event Instance for your first subscription package
The Instances are going to be the individual subscription packages, so name your Event Instance after the package you're offering. Set the Instance Date to be the last possible date someone could buy the entire package - i.e. if you're building a "First Fridays" package, pick the morning after the first Friday performance in your season.
5. Fill in the details on the Event Instance like so:
-
Name: this should be the name of the package you are selling
- e.g. "First Fridays", "Fixed 6-show Package", etc.
- Instance Date: set this to just after the first performance in the package
- Sale End Date: whenever you want to stop selling this package online. If you'll keep selling the package right up until that first performance, you can leave this blank.
- Number of Subscriber Selections: leave this blank; it's used only for CYO subscriptions
-
Venue: select the venue this package will be performed in
- If your package includes shows that occur in more than one venue, leave this blank
- Active: must be checked to sell this subscription package
- Subscription Type: Fixed
- Click Save!
Make sure that you pick the correct Subscription Type! After associating Price Levels with this subscription, you won't be able to change the Subscription Type anymore.
6. Enable PYOS subscriptions (optional)
If you'd like to give your patrons the ability to choose their own seats online when they purchase this subscription, you can turn on Pick Your Own Seat (PYOS) subscriptions.
To do this, first click "Edit"
Then check "Enable Online Seat Selection" and save.
7. Create a new Ticket Allocation
A quick note about subscription Allocations and Price Levels: when you're finished, each subscription Price Level should map to exactly one retail Price Level on a given Event Instance. That means there should also be a one-to-one correlation between subscription Allocations and Allocations on your retail Event Instances.
Said differently, if you sell Adult and Student subscriptions and your venue has three Allocations, you'd have three subscription package Allocations, each with an Adult and a Student subscription Price Level, for a total of six different package options.
-
Allocation Name: this should mirror Allocations in the single ticket events this package contains
- e.g. "Orchestra", "Balcony"
- Sale Status: "Public" if you want to sell subscriptions online (remember they'll only be available to purchase online after the "Sale Start Date" on this subscription Event Instance), or "Private" if you only want to sell the package internally.
- Sort order: when you look at this Event Instance later, this is the order your Allocations will be listed in
If your season performances take place in multiple different venues, your Allocations may not have the same names across all venues. In that case, you may wish to name your subscription Allocations something like "Tier 1", "Tier 2", etc.
The important thing to note is that each subscription Allocation must correspond to one (and only one!) Allocation for each venue used in your season.
This is a requirement if you want patrons to be able to select their own seats online in future, and will also make reporting easier.
8. Add the number of packages available in this Allocation to the Original Quantity field, then click "Save and Create Level"
9. Add as many subscription Price Levels as you want to offer for this Allocation
For example, "Adult" and "Student".
You'll notice the Price column is blank. Don't worry! We'll take care of that later.
10. Enter fees as applicable for each subscription Price Level
Subscription package item fees are set here, for the package as a whole. Any fees you set on the subscription Price Levels you built on your retail Event Instances won't be applied, since the tickets are being sold as a group via this subscription Event Instance.
11. Clone the Event Instance to create other subscription packages
Once all your Allocations and Price Levels are set up, click "Clone" to make more package options (e.g. "Saturday Evening 1", "Sunday Matinee 2", etc). Clone for as many packages as you want to offer, adjusting the dates as needed for each one.
When building multiple packages, the Instance Date controls the order in which the packages are listed. Make each package's Instance Date an hour later than the previous package for easy sorting.
Great work! Now we can connect everything together to create the actual subscriptions
In this final step, we'll link the retail subscription Price Levels to the subscription package framework you built in the last step.
To complete our metaphor, you've got all your season "tickets" built out, you've printed your "envelopes" - now it's time to assemble the whole thing - stuff the "envelopes" with "tickets" so you can start selling!
1. Go to your first Subscription Event Instance
2. Click "View/Edit Price Levels" next to the first Price Level in the package
Click "Expand All" to open up the Allocations if the Price Levels are hidden - and note that there's a default setting you can adjust in PatronTicket Settings to have them expanded automatically, which is handy while building subscriptions!
3. Use the filters to get the retail subscription price levels you created for this package on one screen
Recommended filters:
- Set Visibility to "Subscription"
- Use asterisks as a wildcard:
- If you've named your single ticket events with your season in front, it's easy to find all the Price Levels at once
- e.g. "2024*" could bring up all your Ticketable Events you're presenting in the 2024 season
- If this package is for Friday showings, use "Friday*" in the Event Instance filter
- If you've named your single ticket events with your season in front, it's easy to find all the Price Levels at once
- Set Allocation to the Allocation you're working on right now
- Use the "|" character as an "or" filter
- e.g. "The Tempest | Kiss of the Spider Woman | Flora, The Red Menace"
Not seeing any Price Levels? Make sure the Ticketable Events and the Event Instances that you're filtering for are set to "Active".
What are we doing here?
We're telling the system, "When a subscriber purchases this package at this Price Level, they're going to get these specific tickets to these shows."
4. Associate the correct Price Levels for this subscription package
If you've been able to isolate the Price Levels you're adding to this subscription Price Level, you can just click the "Associate All # Price Levels" button - otherwise you can use the checkboxes on the left and click "Associate Selected Price Levels"
The associated price levels will move to the top. You can adjust filters and repeat this process if you need to add more Price Levels for this subscription package.
5. Once you've associated all the right Price Levels, click "Done"
6. Review the number of mapped levels and the resulting price
Back on the subscription Event Instance, you'll now see the number of retail Price Levels (i.e. the number of tickets) associated with the subscription Price Level, as well as the resulting price of the package.
7. Repeat this process for each subscription Price Level to finish building your packages
That's it - you've built your Fixed subscriptions! Nice job!
One more thing - do you plan to renew this package next year?
If you'll be using the subscription renewal tool to roll over the packages you sell this year to the next, follow the steps in this article to create your series.
Doing this step now will ensure that seat preference records are created for your subscribers as they purchase these packages, which will make it easier to renew them next year.