Axanar moves for the second time in two years, again to an ever-smaller facility

Daily Patreon signups climbed into double digits for the first time since January 23. The 11-donor uptick followed Axanar producer Alec Peters’ acknowledgement he likely wasn’t going to raise the $4,000 a month he needed to keep the 6,000 square foot warehouse that now houses Axanar.

Monthly earnings rolled past $1,500 on Sunday, thanks to a single-day $72 boost from donors. That likely makes it possible for Peters to afford the new 3,000 square foot facility. He expects that to cost $2,500 per month.

The encouraging upswing, however, doesn’t deviate much from the overall trend AxaMonitor’s analysis pegs at monthly earnings of less than $2,500 by April 1, assuming nothing major happens in the funding effort. Axanar’s move is scheduled May 1.

We’ve seen all this happen before, the last time Peters turned to Axanar fans to save a building he could no longer afford. This time, though, he lost his corporate sponsorship for reasons he’s had trouble explaining.

SPURRING DONATIONS? Axanar surrogate Jonathan Lane speculates about the effect of AxaMonitor’s coverage on Patreon donations. Click image to view full size. Image/Facebook

On Facebook, Axanar surrogate Jonathan Lane sarcastically thanked AxaMonitor for spurring donations after each of its recent articles:

I would like to personally thank Carlos Pedraza for helping to increase donations to the Ares Studios Patreon by writing blogs pointing out how slow donations had gotten. We couldn’t have done it without ya, Carlos! (Well, actually, yeah, we could have. But I still love it when the good guys win.) Remember, you can help make Carlos even more wrong by signing up to donate.¹⁾

THE NUMBERS from the Patreon campaign tell the whole story behind its trouble achieving its $4,000 goal. Click image to see chart full size.

Pedraza replied that Lane was only looking at half the Patreon metrics:

Indeed, your numbers continue to climb, and I clearly acknowledge that you’re on track to raise quite a bit of money — just not enough to keep the current warehouse. By focusing solely on total dollars pledged, you’re ignoring the other half of the story, which I show in this graph: The number of new donors and amount donated each day is very low, often flirting with zero. So far, even with what you call my remarkable assistance in spurring donations, giving remains right on track with what statistical analysis projects.²⁾

While Lane’s post “certainly … rallies the troops (temporarily),” Pedraza replied, “if the success of your effort depends on … trying to prove me wrong, rather than on its own merits, you need to reevaluate the value proposition you’re offering to your donors.”³⁾

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