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Date: | Thu, 16 Oct 1997 12:34:52 -0500 |
Content-Type: | TEXT/PLAIN |
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On Thu, 16 Oct 1997, Henry B. Crawford wrote:
Chris Dill said:
:| > " placement of gift shop merchandise cases (platforms
:| > and vitrines) within or adjacent to exhibits? What is
:| > the general opinion of this practice?"
:| >
:| > Sounds like good marketing to me. I certainly
:| > appreciate them as a consumer (read: museum shop
:| > junkie) when I travel. Obviously, you don't want the
:| > marketing to interfere with the exhibition's
:| > presentation, but that's just a matter of design.
:|
:| I've been in, and worked in museums which did this well and quite
:| tastefully. Of note, years ago when the Art Institute of Chicago did
:| Pompeii, the exhibit traffic flow went right into a special Pompeii gift
:| shop. Among the items for sale were the two volume set of exhibit catalogs
:| (which I bought) and posters of surviving Pompeii art work.
:|
:| It was a stroke of marketing genius, and I don't think the public
:| complained about it.
:|
:| As a museum professional visiting, I appreciated the effort. The only way
:| that it would not work, is if it created a bottleneck at the exit of the
:| exhibit, but that's a matter of design, not of concept. There was no
:| bottleneck at Pompeii. Nor was there a problem during the " Cenote of
:| Sacrifice" exhibit which we did at Milwaukee Public Museum back in 1987,
:| when I was Registrar. The gift shop did quite well, as I recall.
You've got three major items to address: traffic management, product
selection and staffing. The exhibit store should be easy for both
customers to navigate and non-customers to bypass (but make it
easier for the customers). The products carried in the store have
to be very tightly focused on the exhibit but you should have a
couple of "generic" museum items (pick your best sellers) for the
folks who want to do "one-stop souvenir shopping." And your staff
has to be well-educated in exhibit and merchandise knowledge along
with strong customer service skills. These people should be your
best workers.
Rich Johnson
Director of Marketing
Cotton Expressions Imprinted Apparel
http://www.cottonexpress.com
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