Louisiana Children’s Museum hosts Taylor Swift raffle to fund ‘Museum for All’ gap

Written By Alicia Vial

Situation

The Louisiana Children’s Museum’s (LCM) vision is to expand programming and access to children of all backgrounds across the state of Louisiana. In pursuit of this vision, LCM implemented new programs like Helis Foundation Days and the Museums for All program, which grants $2 per person admission for families receiving SNAP benefits throughout the year, made possible by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. While essential to the museum’s mission, the resulting reduction in earned admission revenue left a deficit in the budget.

To help fund this gap, LCM partnered with The Four Seasons Hotel New Orleans to offer a pair of suite tickets for the Taylor Swift Eras Tour and a one-night stay in the hotel with breakfast at their award-winning restaurant, Chemin à la Mer.

To promote this opportunity to experience the Ears Tour, LCM partnered with Gambel Communications for a public relations and paid media campaign to promote raffle ticket sales.

Strategy

Gambel Communications advised LCM to officially unveil the Taylor Swift raffle campaign at the museum’s annual fundraising gala, Play Soirée. This provided an opportunity to cross-promote the campaign in the media alongside regular gala outreach and aimed to increase on-site raffle ticket sales at the event.

To maximize fundraising, Gambel Communications leveraged the local Reddit community’s power and identified more than a dozen markets and Reddit threads for paid media outreach and layered in social media advertising in three additional drive markets identified during research.

Tapping into the local influencer marketing landscape, Gambel Communications negotiated a partnership with Greg Kata (@Gregisms) that showcased the mission of LCM while highlighting the opportunity to win tickets to see Taylor Swift and enjoy a stay at The Four Seasons.

Evaluation

LCM’s Taylor Swift raffle campaign sold 562 raffle tickets, for a total of $112,400 raised to help fund the deficit from earned admissions revenue, allowing the museum to continue essential programming providing access to disadvantaged families for another year of operations. 

  • Sponsored influencer content on @Gregisms resulted in more than 161,357 post views and over 40 days of collective video watch time across three platforms (Facebook, Instagram and TikTok). Ultimately, Greg’s content raised $45,600 in the first 24-hours of posting on Meta and accounted for more than 60% of overall ticket sales. The influencer and paid media campaign to promote LCM’s Taylor Swift ticket raffle resulted in 200% more tickets sold than a similar raffle hosted by a comparable nonprofit organization in New Orleans at the same time.

  • The Reddit ads served more than 5.3 million impressions and recieved 18,944 clicks.

  • Gambel Communications secured 13 media mentions, including a front page story in The Times-Picayune, reaching an estimated total of 39.62 million in aggregate readership.



Alicia Vial

Alicia Vial is a New Orleans native with more than a decade of experience elevating client stories and leading crisis response. As the senior director of strategy, Alicia acts as a leader within the Gambel Communications team ensuring each agency team member is positioned to deliver strategic public relations services that meet the highest standards of the industry. In addition to supporting the agency’s long-term business growth and development, she coordinates day-to-day account services and oversees strategic direction while staying abreast of best practices and industry trends to provide innovative solutions to meet client’s needs.

Before joining Gambel Communications, Alicia served as the communications director for the Louisiana SPCA, the oldest and largest animal welfare organization in Louisiana that impacts more than 74,000 animals per year. During her nearly eight-year tenure, Alicia oversaw numerous crises, served on national communication taskforces, oversaw all aspects of internal and external relations and worked alongside the development department to raise critical funding. Prior to that, she worked in the fast-paced New Orleans hospitality industry focusing on digital public relations for multiple hotels.

Alicia is a member of the Public Relations Association of Louisiana (PRAL), Southern Public Relations Federation (SPRF), a board member of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) New Orleans Chapter and a member of the New Orleans Regional Leadership Institute. An accredited public relations practitioner (APR), Alicia is also certified in crisis communications, organizational leadership, content marketing and social media.

A well respected and trusted public relations practitioner, Alicia has been recognized by SPRF as a ‘Senior Practitioner of the Year’. Dubbed early on in her career as one to watch, she also received the ‘Rising Star’ award by PRAL and was profiled in St. Charles Avenue Magazine as part of their Young Bloods series. Most recently, she was recognized at PRSA’s annual Fleurish Awards and received four Awards of Excellence for her work along with the ‘Plate Spinner’ award for her efforts on the board of directors for the chapter.

An LSU graduate, Alicia received a bachelor's degree in mass communications with a concentration in public relations and minors in business administration and leadership development. She is a frequent speaker and presenter on public relations topics, most recently presenting at the Jefferson Economic Development Commission and SPRF annual conference.

When Alicia is not at work, you can find her at the ballpark with her three boys or cheering on the Tigers in Death Valley.

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