Just curious to see what other museums have experienced this summer in regard to ridership for the Day Out With Thomas events? Is yours up, down, or about the same. We experienced a slight increase over last year, although we added more trains.



david.wilkins@inisightbb.com

David, NCTM's Thomas event is not until fall. Talking to others, things are all across the board but mostly off this year. Some of it is the economy, but some of it is the region--too much Thomas in some areas of the country. Also, folks seem to be hanging onto their money later this year. One venue I talked with reported that advance sales were off by half but that 75 percent of their sales came within the last 2-3 weeks before the event. Jim

http://nctrans.org
Wrinnbo@aol.com

Yeah, I hear that oversaturation is a problem. However, like I said, our ridership was up, and we ran out of stuff to sell the first weekend. People were buying mostly big ticket items that we had to reorder after only the second day. If we do the event again next year (very likely) then we are plannig on ensuring that we have enough items to sell.

david.wilkins@inisightbb.com

Our DOWT event was an incredible success; better than last year's. Oddly, the economy, which is much worse in our neck of the woods (just outside the Seattle area) than in most places, didn't seem to hurt us that bad. But we weren't competing with nearby events, either; the nearest DOWT, which would happen the following weekend, was about a hundred miles away.

--Keith

I'm not privy to the financial info of the museum (I'm a mere mortal volunteer), but the consensus among members is that the museum really doesn't make a lot of money off the event itself, but it does generate considerable interest and publicity while providing something to get the kids tired. Apparently, lots of parents think it's money well spent, and it helps the museum in the long run.

My opinion is, the more public exposure your museum gets--by whatever legal and positive means necessary--the more your museum will benefit, even if it's not directly in the wallet.

> David, NCTM's Thomas event is not until
> fall. Talking to others, things are all
> across the board but mostly off this year.
> Some of it is the economy, but some of it is
> the region--too much Thomas in some areas of
> the country. Also, folks seem to be hanging
> onto their money later this year. One venue
> I talked with reported that advance sales
> were off by half but that 75 percent of
> their sales came within the last 2-3 weeks
> before the event. Jim


Northwest Railway Museum
k.deshaies@comcast.net