Mike, Thanks for your interest in museums as destination points! The California Association of Museums conference recently held in San Diego dealt with a number of issues potentially interesting to someone like yourself--the subject was funding for museums, but the emphasis was on how to tap in to both audiences and money by working with the tourism industry. We had representatives of the California Tourism Dept. (not their exact name) and museum people who are interested in expanding contacts. Patrick Ela, Director of the Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles was a panelist and he has been active in working with the Los Angeles Chamber and Convention Bureau to promote museums as a component of cultural tourism. There are lots of potential dimensions to links with tourism. There's the fairly common "bus tour" that comes to the museum--paying a tour fee and spending money in the gift shop. There may be opportunities to open doors (or gates, as the case may be) to visitors attending conventions in a given city. And there are opportunities to work with travel agencies to have people extend their trips to a destination by visiting a museum or two. For example, someone flies into Anaheim to go to Disneyland, maybe Knott's Berry Farm, or Universal Studios. In fact, you can go to this kind of place in many cities across the U.S. So why come to LA for all this? One way to attract people is to offer something unique to your area--something they can't find somewhere else--a cultural resource such as can be found in a museum. There's a lot more to this than just the few points I'm offering. Including questions about potential pitfalls--do you begin to cater to tourists? Do you go so far in this direction that you move away from your mission? These are the same questions that arise whenever a museum begins to look for ways to increase funding. If you can avoid the slippery slope, then there may be real opportunities to attract new funds and do a better job of achieving the mission. I'd be interested to read other people's comments on this subject. Maybe somebody out there has some experiences they'd like to share. Maybe Patrick Ela or someone at Craft and Folk Art would like to add to the discussion? -Richard Chute Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden [log in to unmask]