The company receives support from charitable foundations, such as the Fund for Maryland's Future, the Sprenger-Lang Foundation, MARPAT Foundation, the Meyer Foundation, the Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation and individual donors, as well as from ticket sales and program advertising. The company's name is a reference to the Savoy Theatre in London, where the Gilbert and Sullivan operas were originally presented in the 1880s and 1890s by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and to aficionados and performers of the Savoy operas. In 1986, Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist (later Chief Justice of the United States) joined the Washington Savoyards as "the Solicitor" in its production of Gilbert and Sullivan's "Patience".