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Patricia Nicholson
Principal

Paulette McDaniels
Senior TeleServices Manager



Patricia Nicholson

Smart Founder and Principal 


Patricia Nicholson founded
SMART Marketing in 2005 to provide superior marketing and public relations services to small and mid-sized arts organizations.

Prior to founding
SMART, Ms. Nicholson was Marketing Director for Chicago’s Goodman Theater.  During her 6-year tenure, she oversaw subscription, single ticket, and group sales campaigns that attracted more than 250,000 patrons annually and generated in excess of $9 million per season and oversaw all marketing efforts surrounding the company’s move to its new location in Chicago’s North Loop Theatre District.  In her first season at the Goodman, she grew the subscription base by 7%, and increased it to nearly 27,000 subscribers during the season of the move. 

Prior to joining the Goodman, Ms. Nicholson worked for 9 years at Arena Stage with Zelda Fichandler and Tom Fichandler, where her marketing efforts increased the subscription base from 15,000 to 18,500 in 24 months; and for 5 years at La Jolla Playhouse with Des McAnuff and Alan Levey, where she increased the subscription base by 75% in her first season.  She has also served as Marketing Director for the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago, Virginia Opera, and the Philadelphia Drama Guild. 

Ms. Nicholson has worked with many of the most important artists of our time, including Stephen Sondheim, Harold Prince, Pete Townshend, August Wilson, Yuri Lyubimov, Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, Athol Fugard, Rebecca Gilman, Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, Tom Lehrer, and Bill Irwin.  She was marketing director for the world premieres of The Who’s Tommy at La Jolla Playhouse, Sondheim’s Bounce and August Wilson’s GEM OF THE OCEAN at the Goodman Theatre, Stephen Flaherty and Frank Galati’s LOVING REPEATING at About Face Theatre, and the American premiere of Yuri Lyubimov’s CRIME AND PUNISHMENT at Arena Stage. 

In Washington, D.C., Ms. Nicholson was a Founding Producer of THE HOLIDAY PERFORMANCE, an annual benefit to raise food for the Capitol Area Community Food Bank.  She has taught theater management and marketing at the University of Maryland and the University of California – San Diego.

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Paulette McDaniels
Senior TeleServices Manager

Paulette McDaniels has worked as a telemarketing manager for arts organizations for the last 25 years. Most recently she has managed both subscription and fundraising phone campaigns for  the Chicago Sinfonietta, and she has previously managed campaigns for Drury Lane (Evergreen Park), Chicago Opera Theatre, Victory Gardens, Joffrey Ballet and the Chicago City Ballet, as well as the American Medical Association. She has worked as assistant manager on campaigns at Goodman Theatre, Lyric Opera and Windy City Gay Chorus.  As an actor she is the holder of the BTAA award for her work in Onyx Theatre’s Flyin’ West and her films include A Family Thing, and Losing Isaiah. Paulette is associate producer of Ark Productions (www.arkproductionschicago.com) as well as the author of A Deadly Silence, a screenplay commissioned by the department of Health and Human Services about the effect of AIDS on young women around the world.


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© 2009 SMART
Strategic Marketing for the Arts
811 W Evergreen St., Suite 101B
Chicago, IL  60642
312.321.0056

Email Patricia.