🎨 Run a museum, make $1m+ per year

Have you ever found yourself getting misty eyed during a Gatorade commercial?

It’s not just a you problem (though your boss was extra mean that day).

Heavy Duty Projects is working behind the scenes to create ad music that pulls on consumer heartstrings.

The LA-based production company works with brands, ad agencies, and media companies on:

• Music supervision: providing expertise, sourcing songs, and guiding brands through the selection process.
• Original compositions: recording custom music around a brand’s needs.
• Artist collaborations: handling collaborations and negotiations between clients and talent.
• Covers and remixes: post-production services like sound design, mixing, and audio finishing.

Heavy Duty Projects works with its roster of artists and composers to take a client’s vision from initial concept to final product using demo tapes and rounds of revisions.

Brands like 7-Eleven, Sweetgreen, Nike, and Apple have tapped the studio for projects ranging from TV ads and shows to video game scores.

Brands are turning up the volume

Sound can be a powerful tool for getting customers to buy things, but it can get pricey.

The most affordable route for brands is stock music, followed by custom audio, with licensing from major artists as the big-ticket option.

But, for many brands, the right music is worth it.

“Every creative wants the music to support the story in the best way possible,” the company’s co-founder Kate Urcioli tells The Hustle. “A lot of times, custom music is the only way to do that.”

High costs have pushed some brands to look for other avenues: Coca-Cola launched Coke Studio, an in-house music shop, to create its own original music.

And on TikTok: Brands can work with vetted sound partners (like Heavy Duty Projects) to create original audio for use in campaigns on the platform.

For now, we’ll just be over here playing this Carl’s Jr. banger on repeat.

Welcome to society’s latest episode of “The Haves and the Have-Nots.” Today, the gulf is rapidly widening between top-tier museums, theater groups, and orchestras and their less-affluent community peers.

• Kicking ass: America’s most influential big-city arts organizations, where top executives are drawing seven-figure salaries.
• Kicking rocks: Smaller museums, nonprofit theater groups, and local orchestras, many of which are facing steep deficits.

Let’s talk about the sad one first

This decade has packed a dangerous cocktail for localized cultural institutions, between a slow pandemic recovery, steep inflation, and labor shortages. Now, many are in peril:

• This summer has seen cost-cutting measures at nonprofit stage companies around the US, per The Hollywood Reporter — from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival to the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
• Some mid-size museums, like Iowa’s National Motorcycle Museum and Virginia’s AAF Tank Museum, are closing their doors for good.
• Labor issues may slow the Philadelphia Orchestra, while others, like the New Jersey Symphony, cut back on staff and programming.

On the other side of the coin…

Though not immune to inflation and post-pandemic visitor slumps, brand-name arts organizations feel the strain without the same sense of immediate danger.

• One thing helping: a greater ability to pass rising costs along to patrons. New York’s Guggenheim Museum raised ticket prices to an all-time high of $30, while the Art Institute of Chicago charges $32 for admission.

Another sign that things aren’t so dire can be found in the corner office — The New York Times identified 29 art bosses, from NYC’s Lincoln Center to LA’s Getty Museum, taking home $500k+ salaries. Those jobs are also often accentuated with housing allowances and first-class travel perks.

Oh, to be a “have”: The director of NYC’s MoMa tops the list with a $2m annual salary — not counting a rent-free apartment above the museum.

$250k+: The price a very rare $1k bill may fetch at auction this month. The Federal Reserve Note from 1918 features Alexander Hamilton on its front. In 1928, Grover Cleveland’s portrait replaced Hamilton’s, and in 1969, the $1k bill was discontinued along with the $500, $5k, and $10k bills.

$500k: Latest funding round for Jbrds, a footwear brand that offers anatomically designed shoes for children. Its first product, for 9- to 18-month-olds, looks kinda like Velcro-strapped Crocs with socks. The company will focus next on releasing shoes designed for the developmental needs of kids up to 8 years old.

1.4k+: The number of US police departments now using surveillance drones. In NYC, police deployed drones over Labor Day weekend to monitor unruly parties, drawing backlash from privacy advocates. The city said it was just utilizing its assets. Coming into the weekend, NYPD had used its drones 124x in 2023, up from just 4x last year.

$26m: AMC’s new record for single-day ticket sales, brought about by — Who else? — Taylor Swift, less than three hours after tickets for her Eras Tour concert film went on sale. The previous record holder was Spider-Man: No Way Home, earning $16.9m.