What happens when two small but mighty museums decide to rethink the price of admission to reach wider and more diverse audiences? The Thackray Museum of Medicine in Leeds and Foundling Museum in London have each pioneered innovative, inclusive ticketing models, designed to break down price barriers, engage under-represented communities, and sustain vital ticketing income. In this joint session, Rosie and Edward will share real results – what worked, what didn’t, and lessons learned along the way. Expect live data, community stories, and operational realities behind these initiatives – from managing perceptions of value, digital headaches, ticketing system and website wrangling to securing leadership buy-in and managing change. Two cities, two approaches, one mission: opening museum doors wider than ever before.

The Bodleian Library has been the number one thing to do in Oxford on Trip Advisor for over five years, taking Silver in the 2024 Beautiful South Awards, and the 2025 Trip Advisor Travellers Choice Best of the Best Award. This year the attraction will welcome just under one million visitors, a quarter of whom will go on a tour. Discover how the team consistently deliver a world class experience, plus what’s next for Bodleian Libraries and how they are pushing the boundaries with truly innovative product and experiences.

A real life experience that none of us want to see – a digital upgrade followed by a dip in donations on one of your biggest revenue driving platforms: the online ticketing flow. Charlie and Kate will share a human approach to responding in a crisis, with practical tips, revenue driving techniques and personal skills used to overcome and improve how donations are received through the ticketing flow.

Join Cultural Enterprises, Decision House, and a panel of experts for an essential Commercial Insights session reviewing the 2025 Commercial Performance Barometer. Explore audience and key commercial data across free vs. paid, indoor vs. outdoor venues, and regional variances, plus and uncover key trends shaping sector revenue. Chaired by Interim COO Tom Dawson, this state-of-the-nation session will also look ahead to 2026 – insight you won’t get anywhere else.  

Venue hire can be a headache if it’s not set up properly – fragmented systems, unclear packages, and a whole lot of faff. Discover how Shakespeare North Playhouse have turned things around, creating a streamlined, profitable, and efficient venue hire offer that still delivers top-notch quality. James will share insights from a rebrand of catering and hospitality, the systems that were tightened up (utilising software such as YesPlan), and how they make sure every event lands just right, leaving the drama for the stage!

What makes a space both commercially successful and culturally relevant? This session will explore how successful Retail and F&B spaces drive secondary spend by aligning experience, design, product, and storytelling with brand identity and audience needs. James will explore how understanding customers and avoiding short-term compromises protects authenticity, as well as how flexible, evolving spaces can adapt to shifting behaviours, sustainability goals, and operational demands — staying relevant, profitable, and true to their brand while celebrating what makes them unique.

Discover how underused spaces can become sustainable income streams. Using the Albany’s Creative Communities initiative as a case study, this session explores how offering
workspace facilities can help diversify venue hire income, engage new audiences and deliver impact. Learn how the team built a membership model, workspace facilities, self-booking system, and developed new partnerships to unlock new grants opportunities. Ideal for organisations seeking to explore new ways of using space to generate income whilst deepening their engagement with local individuals and businesses.

Wild Republic Retail worked closely with the BBC Live Events team to design and set up shops at the BBC Earth Experience in London and Melbourne. This was an immersive experience featuring the best of Sir David Attenborough’s film footage. Jeremy will share challenges and learnings, with all merchandise ranges and shop fits going through stringent approval processes for sustainability and recycled materials, ready for the shops to be operated.

In 2025 Kiplin Hall opened a new visitor centre in an old stable block, allowing the shop, café and admissions to be moved out of the main hall. It also allowed a change to the
visitor journey, securing the pay barrier and moving the café and retail outside it. The move has seen café taking double (up to £300k) and the shop taking quadruple (up to £40k) versus 2024 figures, and all of this off a visitor uplift of 20% (+4,000) over the previous year. James will discuss the reasons for the move, challenges along the way and how the new centre has had a massive positive impact on operations and visitor experience, providing a whole new level of sustainability for the organisation and widening options for the years to come.

Discover how UK Parliament’s small team of 12 reversed the outsourcing trend and reclaimed frontline services through a nearly cost-neutral, human-centred Contact Centre handling up to 900 calls daily. Faster responses, clear ownership, smarter data, and genuine human connection: a winning motion for service excellence at any scale. This session will address the challenges faced by box office leaders, customer service leads, operations directors, and senior managers in cultural organisations of all sizes navigating decisions around outsourced services, digital-first models, or contact centre operations.

Join Alexander to explore how drinks tasting events can unlock new revenue streams, attract corporate partners, and sell out audiences with wine, whisky, gin, and beer experiences. Discover how heritage venues are using tastings to engage new audiences; boost revenue with high-ticket tastings, sponsorships, and repeat bookings; and to forge powerful partnerships, aligning with corporate clients for exclusive events.

This session examines recruitment as a strategic lever for shaping the future of cultural organisations. The panel will explore how rethinking talent, leadership qualities and organisational culture can strengthen resilience, inclusion and innovation across the sector. Discussion will focus on shifting from “culture fit” to “culture add,” challenging embedded assumptions, and understanding how recruitment decisions influence long-term organisational direction. Delegates will gain insight into how strategic hiring can redefine culture, purpose and leadership for the years ahead.

Museums and galleries play a dual role in the image rights world – owning images of works that can generate income, and also licensing images for their own publications and
materials. This session will look at ways to create revenue opportunities from your digitised collection whilst ensuring artists and estates are treated fairly; clear rights confidently, reducing risk and saving valuable time; and streamline processes to provide efficiencies in time and cost with one central point of contact.

A journey through spices, heritage and modern retail, in conversation with Sanjay Aggarwal. Co-Founder and Chief Spice Officer at Spice Kitchen, Sanjay talks about his family story, the origins of his small family business (founded as a retirement hobby for his mum Shashi) and his mission to make family mealtimes easy, delicious and joyful.

Built in 1395, The Crooked House is one of the world’s most photographed homes. Today, it’s home to two ‘Crooked Men’ – husbands Alex and Oli Khalil-Martin – who share its 600-year story through award-winning immersive experiences, attracting worldwide visitors and building a ‘Crooked community’ of over 60,000 supporters. Alex and Oli will share learnings and advice on how to deliver stand-out visitor experiences and reap the rewards of doing things differently.

Discover how the Black Country Living Museum team turned everyday food outlets into vibrant, high-performing destinations. By empowering staff ideas, celebrating Black Country heritage, and making smart, simple changes, they unlocked exceptional commercial results – and reshaped the visitor experience along the way.

Royal Armouries pivoted its IP and Licensing business in 2020 to become Royal Armouries Entertainment, originally an image library and now providing comprehensive IP solutions to some of the world’s biggest entertainment brands including Hasbro / eOne Dungeons and Dragons Movie, Square Enix (Final Fantasy) and Doom. Adam will discuss how to reposition a cultural business exploring internal challenges, the impact of new technology including AI, and how this work connects with the UK government’s sector plan combining the efforts of the cultural and creative industries to develop IP into one of the UK’s biggest international exports.

Hampton Court Palace is in the middle of what staff are affectionately calling ‘Scaffold Season’. Like many heritage attractions, a build up of Covid-delayed projects has meant a lot of work happening at the same time, threatening huge impacts on the visitor experience, visitor numbers and the bottom line. This session will discuss how visitor attractions can remain open and viable during major works, including maintaining a positive visitor experience despite disruptions, using conservation works as a storytelling opportunity to engage audiences, and implementing flexible ticketing and pricing strategies.

Cultural institutions champion values—yet some retail shelves often tell a different story. This session exposes the gap between mission statements and merchandise, and shows how museums, galleries, and heritage sites can align retail with ethics without falling into sustainability theatre. Learn why transparency matters to today’s conscious consumers, how Hold Everything Bags built full supply-chain visibility from day one, and take away practical tools to audit, improve, and communicate your sourcing. Leave with a clear action plan—and an easier alternative.

The National Trust for Scotland has developed a core range of property bespoke collectables over the past three years. This range development has resulted in collectable category sales doubling against pre-pandemic levels. Alex will explain this approach to this category development through customer focus, operational logistics, themes, product selection, suppliers and partnerships.

With over 16.1 million disabled people in the UK, improving accessibility isn’t just inclusive, it’s a smart strategy for visitor growth. Discover how All In, the new UK and Ireland access scheme for creativity and culture, is helping organisations build confidence, remove barriers, and welcome more disabled people into their spaces. Andrew will share insights from the pilot programme and early adopters, and discuss how its Accessibility Standards are set to bring clarity and consistency across the sector. 

This session is aimed at everyone who wants to utilise technology to drive growth. The session will explore ‘stacking’ and demonstrate how you can push the boundaries of what’s on the shelf, make tweaks and amends and connect multiple apps or programs to get ‘big system results’ on smaller budgets. Kingston will share why BMT chose to build its own ticketing system as a Shopify app – the good, the bad and the ugly alongside what they’re doing around CRM, mailers and a few other exciting tech insights.

The team at Castle Howard are the current holders of the Cultural Enterprises Award for Marketing Campaign of the Year! When it comes to Christmas, they are top of the pops, and in this session Abbi will share their approach to growing an audience and building a world class reputation. It’s true that Christmas can bring out the best and the worst in people, so buckle up to hear the highs and lows of what it really means to be an award winning Christmas experience.

Amgueddfa Cymru is embarking on its biggest ever investment in retail. Having developed a new retail concept, the team have transformed the retail space at Big Pit National Coal Museum, creating a shop truly inspired by the visitor experience and museum collection. From creating over 200 bespoke products to incorporating sound, using original objects as part of visual merchandising to designing a space that reflects the underground mine tour – the aim was to make commercial part of the visitor experience. This session will focus on the learnings from the project, with practical advice and a particular focus on how to create commercial spaces that compliment and reflect the visitor experience – rather than being a ‘commercial bolt on’ – no matter what size venue you are.

This session will explore how Heritage Portfolio venues have transformed food and drink into a storytelling tool, aligning menus with exhibitions, such as V&A Dundee’s themed café
offerings, to deepen visitor connection and boost sales. Abigail and Nicola will also share how the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh’s on-site Kitchen Garden underpins a sustainable, seasonal approach by reducing food miles, supporting local suppliers and creating unique visitor experiences that translate into commercial success. Discover
practical insights on linking catering to cultural programming, embedding sustainability in operations, and balancing innovation with profitability.

In Spring 2025, Birmingham was officially awarded World Craft City status, a globally recognised mark of distinction celebrating Birmingham’s rich heritage in jewellery and metalwork, its unique community of skilled makers, and its ongoing commitment to craft, innovation and excellence. Rebecca will discuss the culture and heritage of the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter, what the award means for craft and culture in Birmingham and the UK, and how it can benefit not only Birmingham, Jewellery and Allied Trades, but organisations and companies across the UK.

This panel session will look at hot topics in publishing along with different examples of publishing across the sector – from those without any publishing on staff through to big
organisations. The panel will share challenges, solutions and experiences familiar to us all, from making the most out of organisation programming, often at a moment’s notice, to
partner publishing, sustainability, EUDR, and making books work on site and externally. Relevant to anyone working in publishing, retail and licensing, there will be plenty of time
for audience questions, as well as an opportunity to share challenges and successes!

In this session, Lucy will show how museums can unlock growth by flipping a common mindset: from what do we want to say, to what is our audience actually interested in?
Drawing on experience at national museums and her recent work as a consultant on the Good Food Shows where a shift in campaign approach led to a major uplift in results, Lucy
will share how simple changes can drive deeper engagement and increase income. Learn how to reframe thinking and create events that speak to people on a human level — resulting in more impact and better conversions.

A glimpse into the trends set to shape customer behaviour in the year ahead. We’ll explore the external forces influencing today’s consumers, examine upcoming colour predictions, and consider how these insights can be translated into meaningful shopping experiences. The Retail Trend Report is available exclusively to Cultural Enterprises members.