Before setting up your show information on your computer system, you will want to understand the following terms used in Wintix:
- Show is the term given to the name of a production for sale in Wintix. A show may consist of one performance or a number of performances, collectively called the run. Its performances may be sold individually or as part of a season package.
- Performance is the term used to identify a specific presentation of a show. A performance consists of a unique combination of the performance date and time. If the performance is sold on a reserved seating basis, it also will include a seating chart.
- Season Package (also Season Ticket or Series) refers to a series package consisting of a number of shows. Wintix will allow you to be as flexible as your marketing department is creative when it comes to setting up all those wonderful discounted ticket packages.
- There are three types of season packages:
1. Pre-Defined Series, when the performances in the package are chosen in advance by the producing organization. One example would be an “Opening Night Package,” consisting of all the opening Friday nights of a theatre’s shows during the season.
2. Custom-Selected Series, when the performances in the package are a specific combination, but more random than a pre-defined series. For example, a “THREE PLAY SATURDAY II” series could consist of the second Saturday of the run of each selected show. Alternately, you might have a custom-selected series that includes a first Thursday, a third Saturday and a second Sunday matinee.
3. A Flexible Series, sometimes called a Flex Pack or Select-Your-Own Series, in essence a season gift certificate or gift card. The customer pays in advance for a card or voucher booklet that is valid for making a certain number of reservations throughout the year. The individual performances in this type of series package are not reserved when the season package is sold. Rather, they are selected when the patron contacts you to redeem the pre-sold certificate.
- There are three types of season packages:
- Seating Plan refers to a master seating design for a venue or for a particular seating configuration in a venue. The plan is created first and is then copied to make seating charts for each performance. The first plan is usually created by Center Stage Software. Most organizations will have four to six different seating plans for the same space.
- Seating Chart refers to a copy of the venue’s seating plan that pertains to a specific performance. Wintix automatically attaches a copy of the seating plan to each reserved seating performance that you create. This is then called the seating chart, and it governs all the seats sold for that one performance.
- General Admission (or Festival Seating) refers to tickets that are sold only for admission to a performance. A general admission ticket does not guarantee a specific seat location. Sometimes referred to by patrons as “…where we stand in line and then fight for our seats when the doors open.” Well, yes; something like that.
- Reserved Seating tickets are printed with specific seat numbers and locations which are guaranteed as part of the sale. Patrons and ushers love it, and it’s a cinch with Wintix.
- Hard Tickets refers to tickets not sold and printed from a computer. Anyone who has sold them knows they are aptly named for the (lack of) ease of handling sales. Aren’t you glad you are going to have Wintix do all this work for you?
- Annie Oakley has nothing to do with this chapter, but we wanted to be sure that you are still with us. And, it’s such a great hard ticketing term, we couldn’t resist. An “Annie Oakley” is a hard ticket that is given out on a complimentary basis. The ticket manager (or box office treasurer) punches a hole through a comp ticket to indicate that it was not sold, so that it can not be returned for an exchange or refund (of a cancelled performance, for instance.) The ticket looked as if someone had shot a hole through it, hence the name. “Anything you can do, I can do better [BANG!]”