Where your money goes

D&D in numbers

• We hold approximately 16 events/year - that’s about 100 hours of Open Space conversations
• Our flagship annual D&D takes place outside London at least twice in every three years, in addition to regional satellite events
• Around 1000 people attend a D&D event each year, including about 400 at the annual D&D
• About 40% of attendees are new to D&D every year
• At the last annual D&D there were participants from approximately 96 towns/cities across 8 countries and 4 continents
• The D&D archive contains 2,258 reports (and counting), dating back to 2006. They'll be available on this website shortly...

How much does D&D cost to run?

D&D is run by Improbable, which is a registered charity (number 1155695), and is produced on a not-for-profit basis.

This year 2017-18, the D&D programme will cost around £60,000. Of that, about £15,000 is the costs of making the events happen (e.g. venue hire, materials used at the events, heating and hospitality at the two-day events). £22,000 is Access provision for D/deaf, disabled and disadvantaged participants. About £6,000 is the behind-the-scenes costs, like keeping the website online and the box office set-up. And the remaining £27,000 is the D&D team - the facilitator and co-ordinator at each event; Improbable’s D&D producer; and all the Access, technical and support team at the bigger D&Ds.

Each year we welcome about 1,000 people to D&D events - so if we relied on ticket sales alone to cover the costs, each ticket would cost about £60.

Instead, we try to keep the costs of attending D&D as low as possible so that the conversations can be truly open and accessible. All satellite events are free, with longer events costing at most around £25; meaning our total box office income from D&D is around £8,500/year. Improbable allocates £47,000 of its funding as a National Portfolio Organisation of Arts Council England towards D&D; leaving us with £5,000 to raise each year through donations. 

With your support, we hope to continue to be able to keep the costs of attending D&D as low as possible; and to make the conversations as open and accessible as possible by taking them to new places and providing Access provision wherever we go. You can find out about donating to D&D here.