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From: daemon
To: MUSEUM-L
Subject: Re: Is it a visitor or a tourist?
Date: Wednesday, 9 October 1996 8:07AM

Or is it a 'customer'?

It's very tricky.  Although I can see the value of emphasising 'customer
services' and ensuring the highest quality provision, I have a real problem
with the overall idea of the museum visitor as 'customer'.

Firstly the local community are, via taxes, donations etc., the owners of
public facilities such as museums, and the term 'customer' implies a much
lower level of vested interest.  Seeing our visitors as owners, and
therefore our employers, gives them a much greater stake in the museum and
puts everyone, from curators to admissions staff, on their metal.  Dividing
the community into 'museum people' and 'customers' creates a 'them and us'
attitude which may make us less responsive to the cultural interests of the
community, and them more likely to perceive museums as mere sources of
schoolday education and weekend entertainment.

Secondly treating visitors as 'customers' can, in the long run, lead to a
museum being 'customer driven', sacrificing quality of programming and
intellectual integrity for quick-fix entertainment and a 'bums on seats'
view of visitor services - just as deadly as the 'how dare they invade our
sanctum' attitude.  W S Jevons confronted this issue back in the 1880s in
his article on 'The Use and Abuse of Museums', a century later not much has
changed.

I'd rather see them all as 'visitors'.  Calling everyone who comes in a
'visitor', with the implication of familial rights, at least means giving
equal attention to tourists (non-community visitors), even if it may mean
foregoing some of the 'value for money' mindset of 'customers'.

Heleanor.

Heleanor Feltham
Education and Visitor Services
Sydney Mint Museum
[log in to unmask]
At 10:03 AM 10/9/96 GMT+1000, Heather May wrote:

<snip>
>I would be interested to know how many of you consider your visitors
>'customers' and whether you think the perceived ability to deliver 'quality
>customer service' should take priority over qualifications and experience
in
a
>museum environment?

Depends on the position.  For jobs with a lot of public contact (security
guards, admission cashiers, store clerks, education programmers, docents,
etc. etc.) it is of paramount importance.  For behind-the-scenes folks
(designers, curators, conservators, and so forth), "customer service" is
probably equally as important as academic qualifications and museum
experience.  For what good does it do our institution to have the world's
greatest researchers on staff, if he/she openly despises the visitors -- our
raison d'etre and source of funding?

 -- gene

Eugene W. Dillenburg
Coordinator, Special Projects
Exhibits Department
The Field Museum of Natural History
Chicago, Illinois  60605-2496
V: (312) 922-9410 x636
F: (312) 922-6973
E: [log in to unmask]

"Never pay more than minimum wage for a shirt."

                                -- Bruce Elliott