National survey of COVID-19 Impact on United States Museums

The American Alliance of Museums (formerly American Association of Museums) has released a survey of 750 museum directors and a significant number are fearful that their institutions may face permanent closure due to the pandemic and the economy.

AAM on-line Press Release:
United States May Lose One-third of All Museums, New Survey Shows

Los Angeles Times article:
16% of U.S. museums say they risk closing forever in a prolonged pandemic

New York Times article:
Museum Directors Fear Permanent Closure, an Alliance Survey Shows

Not unlike what I am hearing from small contractors in the commercial and commuter railroad industries. A substantial portion of the "temporary" closures are going to become permanent.

PC

Well... what’s the solution?

Are museums using this time to learn how to create and produce digital content? Or just sitting around waiting for the money to dry up?

Some museums have been doing a lot of on line extension work. The New York City Transportation Museum has been very active, hosting on line activities and presentations. My concern is that many of the more marginal museum operations are in the group identified as most likely to close permanently.

While this is a critical issue, there's an important missing piece of the puzzle.

How many museums responded --- was it 100, 500 700...???

As any good statistician will tell you, the accuracy of counting data is the square root of N.

Then there's the issue of whether the respondents were self selected.

Bob H

Here's the link to a summary version of the actual report. 700+ respondents. Judge for yourself whether any of this is relevant to your museum's situation.

https://www.aam-us.org/wp-content/uploa ... useums.pdf

/s/ Larry
Lawrence G. Lovejoy, P.E.

This. 100x this. 1000x this.

It's about adaptability which is something that I think a lot of our very entitled population just doesn't get.

"I've always been able to have as many people in here as I want"
"We're an in-person experience"
"We don't do computers"
"Facebook is evil and I won't put content there"
"I've been a buggy whip maker, like my daddy before me, since I graduated high school, now give me $100k/yr"
"I've never had to make minor personal sacrifices for the wellbeing of my neighbors"
etc...

Times change. Things change. You either change with them and thrive or don't and don't survive.

The quicker you realize that, the better off you're gonna be.

Most museums are scrambling to increase their digital offerings in an effort to remind their communities that they (these cultural institutions) are still here. However, a heavy digital presence does not generate the level of revenue needed for staffing or paying the bills.

Without school programming, no admissions fees, and an ability to hold events/rental facilities, my own institution has ZERO revenue. Staff has been furloughed. Our director is continually seeking grants, donations etc. We are fortunate that a small portion of our budget comes directly from our local government, who owns both the property and the collection.

I am aware of nearby museums who successfully recieved funds in April from the federal relief funding. The funds were used to pay staff to work on digital content. Now it is July and those museums have spent that money and also remain closed to the public. Staff will now have to go on unemployment.

No one is sitting around eating bon-bons waiting for the money to dry up. But until museums can reopen, it will remain bleak. And when reopening does occur, it will take months if not years for previous revenue levels, and staffing, to return to that of prior years. Business plans will have to be adjusted.

Ken Middlebrook
Curator
History San Jose.

When this first surfaced our railroad ( part tourist, part freight) decided that until it is perceived to be " under control" that most folks will not want to be mingling with strangers. We have now closed our passenger operations until at least Thanksgiving with the high probability that we will end up staying closed until next year.

IMHO until there is widespread availability of a PROVEN, SAFE vaccine this pandemic will remain out of control, with no federal master plan on testing/tracing making us continue to fly blind with the out of control spikes now happening, becoming regular fare.

Ross Rowland

My best guess, based on limited information, is that the earliest an approved vaccine could be deployed in sufficient quantity would be late spring or early summer of next year. A lot of the businesses we know and support won't be around by then.

This is Darwinism, museum-style.
We all know plenty of museums operate on the ragged edge of receivership each month, one step ahead of the bill collectors.
Many (if not most) of those will be gone by the time this thing is over. There's no way around it, same for all the small businesses that went belly-up since this thing started.
Yeah, digital stuff is a way to keep the public aware, but it rarely generates revenue. I for one aren't going to pay anything to look at a museum's stuff online, unless it's some archive I can do something with (which as plans or photos of a RR I really want to look for my own research which don't exist elsewhere).
I have, however, bought some stuff from some gift shops for operations that aren't doing anything right now. I bought some museum swag from some RR and aviation museums this summer and even a cap (the WW2 RR operating unit one) and a shot glass (I collect them from places I travel to) from the White Pass & Yukon right after they said they weren't running this year. They made their usual "can't buy this except on the train" annual hat with the year marking, and I noticed they were going for very little, for obvious reasons. I already have two of them from the times I've ridden there, so I didn't get one. Frankly, I think a 2020-marked WP&Y hat would raise some eyebrows at a show in the future from those who know the line...
Anyway, I think many museums and tourist operations are seriously missing out by not offering all their gift shop stuff online, even before this thing started. But now, they're really missing out. I can't be the only one who might buy some stuff from your gift shop if it's easy to look at and buy.
But I really see this as the only major way for cash flow at this point for the smaller museums which don't have a stash of moolah they can fall back on for right now (which we'll all agree is a small number of museums).
The bottom line here is that once this thing is finally over, and I think most folks are starting to realize that all of 2020 is done and we can likely expect it go well into 2021 or maybe even beyond at this rate (thanks to all the 'this won't happen to me' types who contributed to the spread by not taking the most basic of precautions)...

And maybe this isn't such a bad thing. Any chain is only as strong as its weakest link. If the outmoded or unsustainably managed organizations do die off, sure, we have their history to also interpret but we also have dedicated the pool of resources to the sustainable and stronger organizations, better able to be responsible and reliable custodians of history. I'd welcome fewer of the "EMERGENCY! We failed to act so we need to be bailed out!" threads that appear here in the future. How many of the marginal museums have a disposition plan ready to go?

Can I get an Amen for Brother Dave, everyone?
Well said!

Think of all the tiny little 'museums' which were just a couple of guys who decided to put together a 'fly by night' display anyway, which rusts into nothing after a few years when the guys move off or die out, having never allowed any young blood to dare touch their precious toys.
How many were formed when a couple of guys from one operation get offended at something, take their ball and bat and go off to try to found something nearby, and then both museums suffer?
The only scary thing for me with this is that you're actually going to see a lot more of those 'emergency' messages as those museums have gone under, the former staff left everything in place and the property owner is now firing up the heavy equipment to scrap it, with nobody ever telling anyone ahead of time.
And the bigger museums with the funding, having just scraped by during the pandemic, won't have the means to do anything about it. We all know of small museums with one of two very impressive pieces that a large museum would love to have.
This is going to happen, and those pieces are going to be scrapped in place in several occasions. There's no way to stop that now, unless those who walk away from the failed museums have the foresight to tell someone else right away in case something can be done ahead of the scrappers.

Those of you out there with resources start making plans and collecting pledges now for the resurrection of our industry. Those of you without.... well, might be a good idea to start looking for a good new home for your collections before you completely go under.

A senior exec. with S&P was interviewed today on CNBC and he said that their research shows that approx. 45% of all the small businesses that have been forced to close by the pandemic will not reopen......ever.

That's a VERY scary number as there have been tens of thousands of small businesses forced to close and small businesses employ the majority of Americans.

Looks like the near term outlook is pretty grim.

Ross Rowland