For Love and Money! Employees, Volunteers and economic Performances in USA nonprofit art organizations

The economic performance of nonprofit art organizations is affected by the labour intensity of employees and volunteers. Marketing and, above all, relationship marketing are very important to engage employees and volunteers, emphasize and strengthen their commitments, and maximize the competitive advantage in a resource-constrained sector. A relationship marketing perspective helps art organization to understand who employees and volunteers are and what drives them, and to create a seamless integration between paid and unpaid workers. This facilitates productive relations among staff and volunteers, and their connections to the organization’s goals. The aim of the paper is to profile 300 nonprofit art organizations in the USA in terms of the relationship between their ratio of employees to volunteers and their economic performances in 2015. Following k-means cluster analysis, three main clusters are significant. The most crowded cluster (130 organizations) shows the highest program service revenue with the greatest share of employees. Marketing staff are essential in the The Marketing Expert cluster, who reveals an organization focused on internal labour intensity. The two remaining clusters show higher fundraising expenses, contributions and ratio of volunteers than The Marketing Expert. The external labour intensity of volunteers is essential for art organizations in The Fundraiser cluster with the highest gains and solvency. The paper highlights the joint importance of employees and volunteers in the performance of art organizations, which have so far not been thoroughly investigated using cluster analysis. Relationship marketing plays a pivotal role, which can be further optimized by the managers of these organizations.