Breaking Bad Barriers
We know--we know--that building a world-class destination requires financial commitment. We are not running a lemonade stand on grandma's mahjong table with tiny bathroom Dixie cups. We have invested capital based upon a layered plan that includes projected revenue from a variety of sources, including retail and ticket sales.
For destinations that successfully market themselves as a luxury brand for the 1%, pricing issues are simply a matter of supply and demand, but for destinations that market themselves to the rest of us, it gets tricky.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the 2019 U.S. median household income was $68,703. Start tacking on taxes, rent/mortgage, utilities, education expenses, healthcare, etc., and it is clear that many families of four are not easily able to spend $20 per person at a museum, or $65 at a waterpark, or $100 at a theme park. A destination visit is an event that they must prioritize in order to afford. (My own parents pawned their class rings to take us to Disney World when I was a kid.)
"But wait," you yodel at me through your smartphone, "we give away free stuff all the time!" And you do. According to a 2016 Association of Art Museums' survey, 41% of responding museums offer free admission or only suggest donations. Why aren't those places packed to the rafters?
Time & Travel
Financial barriers often start before the ticket counter. Consider transportation. Are you on a bus or train line that offers regular connections throughout your community? I used to teach at a community center in Winter Garden, FL. It is only a 30-minute drive from the center to the lovely, tree-filled park that houses the Orlando Science Center, Orlando Art Museum, Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, and Orlando Shakespeare Theater. Yet it is currently an hour and forty-five minute bus ride. Do you want to sit with your kids for an hour and forty-five minutes on the bus-both ways--not including walking time to and from the bus stop--to go to a museum, theater or science center? It is easily over four hours of your day on public transportation ... with children. How could you possibly tempt a parent to do this on a Saturday?
Historically, institutions fill their lowest attended days and times with free or reduced price admissions for communities with financial barriers. Though this is certainly logical, it is not a guaranteed barrier-remover. We need to consider why those times were sparsely attended and then ask ourselves some compassion-based questions. For example, after an eight hour shift as a cashier, would you feel like rushing your kids through homework and dinner to take advantage of the free tickets? Or if you worked every weekend, is it worth missing a shift to use the tickets? Ensuring that our offer can reasonably be accepted is key. Otherwise, we are not breaking a barrier, we are just dangling a carrot that is forever, exhaustingly out of reach.
If you remove every barrier you see, and people still don't come, that means it is time to examine your relevance.
Are You Relevant?
Are you offering something that people want? It doesn't matter if you think they should want it, the reality is do they want it? Consider opera. In the early 19th century, it was an art form enjoyed by the masses. Yet when you picture the average opera-goer today, is that what you imagine?
Is opera still as beautiful as it was in 1825?
Yes.
Do people still perceive it as being relevant to their lives?
On the flip side, a local speedway is offering free tickets to this Saturday's race. I saw them when I was getting an oil change but didn't take one because I perceive that what they offer is not relevant to my life. I could be absolutely wrong, but the fact is that I passed up free tickets based upon my feelings of the speedway's relevance.
Nina Simon, founder of the nonprofit OF/BY/FOR ALL, is an expert on making museums relevant to their communities. As she explained in a 2017 TEDx, "Relevance, fundamentally, is not about you telling somebody what you are about, it is about you empathizing with how it feels to be outside that door, trying to figure out if its for you."
Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History - ‘LOST CHILDHOODS’ MAH’s 2017 foster youth exhibit only happened after Simon’s team convinced young people and advocates who had “no reason to trust us, or even know we existed” to participate.
This can be done with a zingy splash, as she and her team at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History did with their community-based exhibit F my Ex, or it can be done with intense, personal work such as their 2017 exhibit "about foster youth made with foster youth," Lost Childhoods.
Relevance may just be the last barrier that our industry faces. Fortunately, we have access to the best barrier-breaking chainsaws: our ability to listen and a commitment to share our passion for destinations with the global community.
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