Creative Grounds: Where relationships run the show

How a no-cut musical theater nonprofit built a home for performers ages 7 through adult — and found a ticketing partner who treats them like family, too.

Mark Landis, executive director and co-founder of Creative Grounds Fine Arts Academy, likes to describe what happens on his stage in a specific way: "You're coming to see a show done by kids, not a kid's show." It's a distinction that matters to him. Every production, whether it's staffed by seven-year-olds or working adults from the community, is held to a professional standard. "We push for a professional-level show," he says. "Many, many people have come to me after shows and said, 'That was as good, if not better, than Broadway.'"

That standard is built on a program philosophy that's rare in youth theater: no cuts. Everyone who auditions gets cast in something. It's a model that's clearly resonating. In January 2018, Creative Grounds auditioned 200 students and adults for a single production of Mary Poppins.

None of it would be possible without the organization's real north star, which Mark points back to again and again: relationships. "Our vision statement is building individuals up through fostering relationships and growing artists," he says. "The relationship piece is a vital and important role in what we do as an organization, and it guides everything we do."

Creative Grounds got its start in 2014 as a ministry of a local church. By 2018, after that record-setting Mary Poppins audition, it was clear the program had outgrown its original home. Creative Grounds became its own independent nonprofit that year, a transition that gave the organization room to grow into what it is today: a full-fledged academy producing three shows every fall and three every spring, with more than 60 productions staged since its founding.

That growth eventually meant a new home, too. Creative Grounds moved into Ransburg Auditorium at the University of Indianapolis, an 800-seat venue that requires its own custom seating configuration, including removing certain rows for the orchestra pit. It's the kind of detail that could easily slow a growing nonprofit down.

When it came time to build out that new seating chart, Creative Grounds leaned on On The Stage's team to get it right. "OTS helps a lot with getting our seating chart set up for the facility at Ransburg Auditorium. That was one of the biggest switches we did," Mark says. "They did a phenomenal job of getting that set up, and it was super easy."

That ease was consistent with Creative Grounds' broader experience switching to OTS in the first place. Before On The Stage, the organization used a UK-based box office tool that got the basics done but stopped there. What changed Mark's mind was automation: "Being able to reach back out to past customers. It would automatically send an email to all those past customers when I set up a show. That is something that wasn't built into the old system. I was really thankful to have that, and that was what drew us there to begin with."

Always-on automated engagement has stayed valuable as Creative Grounds has grown, and it's since been joined by newer tools. Plays, OTS's automated marketing feature, has become a meaningful revenue driver in its own right. "Being able to utilize Plays has garnered some additional sales for us," Mark says. "This last spring, I think it raised another $1,000 in sales. And that was just from having it available for two, maybe three shows."

Behind the scenes, Creative Grounds also counts on OTS when things get busy, which, in the middle of a six-show season, is often. "I've always been able to get a response within 24 to 48 hours at the most," Mark says. "If we're in the middle of a show and I have an issue, the response is very quick. That's always been a benefit to me, not having to worry about that."

For an organization whose mission statement is literally about fostering relationships, how a vendor treats them matters as much as what the vendor's product does. Mark meets with his OTS account team roughly once a month, sometimes just to catch up. "That relationship — being able to have questions answered and communicate, and really just sit and chat about life sometimes — is important," he says. "I think the fact that On The Stage invests in that, and encourages that from their employees and from the customer side too, is a big piece."

That same philosophy of loyalty and long-term relationship shows up everywhere at Creative Grounds, including in its audiences and its own alumni. The organization regularly sees three generations of the same family perform together: grandparents doing shows with their kids and grandkids. And once someone has been part of a Creative Grounds production, Mark says, they're part of the family for good: "Once you're a member of the org, you're always a member."

That's true even years later, and even on a much bigger stage. One Creative Grounds alum played the title role in the organization's production of Mary Poppins and later played Ado Annie in Oklahoma! with the group, one of her last shows before heading off to study musical theater in college. This week, she's making her professional debut playing Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz on a Broadway national touring contract in Florida. Mark and the Creative Grounds team are flying down to surprise her, timing the trip to double as their organization's anniversary week.

This fall, Creative Grounds has three more productions lined up: Lion King Jr., Seussical the Musical TYA (with both students and adult community members in the cast), and a full-length production of Les Misérables School Edition for students. It's a lineup that reflects the range the organization has built over 60-plus shows — family-friendly, ambitious, and open to performers at every stage of their journey.

Through all of that growth, Mark says the constant has been the same kind of partnership Creative Grounds tries to build with its own community. "I like the relationship that OTS puts into place," he says. "It really is a part of the being of who we are as an organization."