Planning ahead for a buoyant 2022
AS the Government’s ‘Plan B’ restrictions come to an end, cultural institutions are trying to work out what the year ahead promises. The situation is in some ways better than might be expected. Athena’s anecdotal impression is that, despite periods of lockdown last year, British visitors came out in strength. Indeed, their numbers compared favourably with the last pre-lockdown year of 2019. Hopefully, therefore, they will do the same in 2022. What was lacking was foreign tourists and any attraction that has come to depend on their presence is expecting a difficult time. No one knows when and in what quantity they will come back, although the appetite for international travel is reviving.
The consensus seems to be that most European visitors will return in the next couple of years. American visitors are likely to follow and, last of all, those from China. Their numbers are predicted to rise to pre-pandemic levels by about 2025.
The imperative over the past two years to manage heritage attractions intensively —with timed tickets and formally structured access—has offered some helpful insights into visiting patterns. At one popular country house, for example, it has emerged that the busiest day of the week for visitors is Tuesday and the busiest time of the day for coming through the front door is 2pm. Why that should be the case is mysterious, but it is very helpful to those running the property.
Booking has also proved a powerful tool, allowing attractions to plan more effectively for the reception of visitors. It’s apparent, moreover, that, whereas people
Visitors want to do more than merely walk around and take pictures
don’t want to be tied down to a particular time of arrival (a necessity during periods of restriction), most are content to book online and to commit to visit somewhere on a particular day. Although booking may be scrapped in some places, it’s a system that’s likely to survive widely.
Most intriguing of all, lockdown seems to have brought about a subtle change in what visitors want from heritage attractions. A few years ago, there was a great emphasis on making accessible particular places where people could photograph themselves and post the image on their social-media account. That desire hasn’t gone away, but it seems to be being superseded by an interest in ‘experiences’. For visitors to a museum or country house, that means doing something more than merely walking around and taking pictures. They also want to enjoy a special event, be shown something or have an opportunity to explore a particular subject.
In this regard, online content produced during lockdown has helped identify points of interest. It has also sometimes enjoyed a degree of afterlife as interpretation. The ending of restrictions feels to Athena like a happy moment happily timed, with spring and summer in prospect. As the moment serves, let’s all get out and see things.