Atlanta Arts & Culture Benchmarking Survey, 2023
This survey was sent to arts and culture nonprofits headquartered in the City of Atlanta in order to gauge their current financial health.
The following are the results collected from 30 respondents.
The survey was jointly administrated by Mint Gallery, Purpose Possible, and Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA). The entire survey results can be downloaded here.
Respondents to the survey are primarily located in the City of Atlanta and greater Fulton County.
The bulk of respondents work in dance, theatre, and the visual arts, though other arts disciplines are represented.
Funding for organizations with budgets less than $500,000 is relatively evenly split across sources, though corporate contributions are lacking, as they are across all budget levels surveyed.
Contributions to organizations with budgets larger than $1M come primarily from foundations, government agencies, and individuals. A number of theaters report significant income from earned income.
Very few organizations have a reserve fund that could sustain them for more than 6 months.
All organizations surveyed pay the artists they collaborate with and employ in order to sustain the arts in our city.
Asked what keeps them awake at night, arts organization leaders cite funding and staff capacity—related topics—as their primary worries.
Their organizations survey a wide range of locations, from the City of Atlanta and beyond.
Respondent organizations can be classified as small- and medium-sized, which is typical of Atlanta’s arts ecosystem.
For organizations with budgets between $500,000 and $1M, most contributed revenue comes from foundations and government agencies, with very little from individuals and corporations.
Almost half of the organizations surveyed ended 2021 and 2022 with budget deficits. Less organizations projected budgets for 2023 & 2024, though that data has certainly changed as a result of actual grant distribution in 2023.
Even fewer organizations have an endowment that spins off funding each year.
Half of organizations surveyed have cut programs as a result of reduced funding in the past years.
