Earlier this week, The Women’s Project announced they would give away 1000 free tickets to their latest play via “download” as their way of “thrusting the medieval enterprise of theatre into the Internet age.”

I’m not sure of all of that, but it sure sounds good in a press release, doesn’t it?  And, that press release went far and wide, including a juicy mention in the Times and on blogs all over the web (present company included).

The WP did one of my favorite things.  They took a problem and turned it into a positive.

Obviously, the show wasn’t selling.

Obviously, they wanted to put butts in the seats to generate word of mouth.

Obviously, they would have comped the 1000 seats anyway (which would have taken a lot of work).

But they got creative, and with this aggressive move, they accomplished the above goals, and got the press to take notice of a new Off-Broadway play.

Also, if you look at their free ticket sign-up site, you’ll notice that they are surveying and collecting snail mail and email addresses (I’d bet money that when they run out of tickets for this promotion, there will be a very nice email blast with a discount offer sent to the people who didn’t get in on time).

Congratulations to The Women’s Project for their courage.  It paid off.

They papered without papering, and got press that was worth a whole lot more than a paid ad.