Visitorship vs Revenue

...And on the other hand, this article reminds me that an increase in visitorship does not necessarily translate into an increase in dollars. So what's a museum to do? Welcome staycationers with open arms, knowing that it won't result in more money now but hoping that it will lead to future memberships and donations? C'mon marketers, development and membership officers--on your toes? How are we going to take this boon of visitors and turn it into ongoing support for our museums?

Increase Admissions by Decreasing Admission?

I'm going to take this as an one more point in favor of my argument that museums (and zoos) should *not* be raising admission prices right now--that they should be keeping them affordable (and preferably on par with or even less than the cost of a movie). The Como Zoo is seeing increased attendance because people can't afford to go away on vacation, so they are taking "staycations." Also, because the Zoo accepts donations rather than charging an admission fee, people who are unemployed can afford to visit and take a break from their troubles.

More on Increased Attendance for Museums

What I like about this article is that, well, yes, it is happy news about museum attendance in the past year, but it also talks about the difficulties and inaccuracies with using attendance as a metric. First of all, what do we count as a visit? Do we count everyone who walks in the door? What if a staff member walks in the front door instead of the staff entrance the guard doing the clicking doesn't recognize the staff member? What about museum members? They aren't bringing in additional money with their repeated visits, at least not through admissions. What about other sorts of members who may have reciprocal privileges and can therefore visit the museum for free? What about school groups--do they get counted separately? So, yes, it is good that museum visit numbers are up, but what does that really mean when all is said and done?

Second, the article offers suggestions for why we are seeing an increase in attendance, such as the fact that astronomical gas prices have kept people closer to home--talk of "staycations" were all the rage this past summer, or citing the "Bilbao effect" (note: the Bilbao effect, when the architecture of a museum inspires and increase in visitorship, is a temporary effect and should not be counted upon for sustained increases!).