Pricing & demand£124 a visit and tickets from £3
A Liverpool City Region Combined Authority news page, with a destination partnership copy dated 23 March 2026, reported an evaluation by AMION Consulting of Shakespeare North Playhouse: about 100,000 visitors a year and £12.4m of visitor spending annually across the city region, £124 a visit by our arithmetic, including offsite spending. Nearly 60% of visitors said it improved their view of Prescot. Brit Brief reported on 26 July 2026 that about 20,000 people from priority postcodes had bought tickets from £3 under a Pay What You Decide scheme. The page gives no period or method for the evaluation.
Why might £124 a visit overstate what reaches Prescot’s shops, and what would you want to check? Practise this in AO2 Application.
Interpreting numbers183,000 tickets and 100,000 visits
The same Brit Brief piece quoted the theatre’s leaders saying 183,000 tickets had been sold over four years, 45,750 a year by our arithmetic, while the evaluation puts visitors at about 100,000 a year. Tickets and visitors are different measures, and the page doesn’t say how a visit is counted or whether it includes the café and tours. It also reported 38 awards and 10% first-time audiences, and the chair’s claim of over £50m invested in Prescot since 2020. The article names no job numbers or business counts, and the local views it quotes are anecdotal.
Why might 45,750 tickets a year and about 100,000 visits both be true, and what would you want to ask? Step by step in AO3 Analysis.
Strategy & stakeholdersA theatre that needed public money
The Combined Authority page put the venue’s cost at £38m, with £11m from the Authority and £18m from Knowsley Council, £29m together and 76.3% of the cost by our arithmetic, plus a further £8m of Authority spending on Prescot public transport. It said the non-profit model and scale limited private finance. The Playhouse’s spring 2026 newsletter said the winning Town of Culture 2028 town would receive £3m and each of two finalists £250,000, and that Prescot has bid. The café owner quoted by Brit Brief welcomed the visitors, and we haven’t checked trading.
Should a council fund a non-profit theatre with public money to regenerate a high street, and who gains or loses? A real judgement for AO4 Evaluation.
Prescot’s economy in the classroom
Wikipedia’s list of settlements in Merseyside by population gives 37,911 for Prescot (2011 census, built-up area subdivision). A theatre’s spend per visit, tickets and visits counted differently and a public funding share give students real contexts for pricing, interpreting figures and judging public investment. We tie these themes to topics on the specification.
Sources: Wikipedia, list of settlements in Merseyside by population (2011 census, built-up area subdivisions); Liverpool City Region Combined Authority news page (undated; a destination partnership copy is dated 23 March 2026); Brit Brief, 26 July 2026; Shakespeare North Playhouse newsletter, spring 2026. The £124, 45,750 a year and 76.3% figures are our arithmetic. The evaluation gives no period or method on the page we read, the ticket and award figures come from the theatre’s own leaders, and we haven’t checked outcomes.
