I would agree with the sentiment of doing surveys or research into your visitor demographics before you make changes with admission costs.  My experience is the reverse of this in that I’ve seen a couple of art centers/museums that were free of charge begin to charge admission without doing much research.  They then lost much of their attendance while not making much with the admission fees—it really wasn’t worth it and killed their attendance, frankly.  Trying to get the visitors back after you make a change can be much harder than understanding who is coming in, why and when, and asking their opinion in regards to fees before you make a change.  You get public buy-in that way and if they have an opportunity to weigh in it is always appreciated and better than folks complaining after the change is made.  Really assess the potential trade-off. 

 

And instead of just dropping the admission fee see what you usually bring in with it (weekly, monthly, annually) and see if you can identify sponsors who will be the admission sponsor for a certain period of time.  When people visit give them a sign that tells them their admission is paid by so-and-so organization this month (or whatever).  That’s a good way to make sure that the income is covered and is good advertising for those local businesses.  I would bet you’d get more attendance that way too—these businesses can then also encourage their employees to visit you.

 

Jodi Lundgren

Exhibitions Curator

South Dakota Art Museum

 

 

 

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