They’re museum tours for people who don’t like museums, and Nick Gray, founder of private museum tour company Museum Hack, was once one of those people.
“I used to hate museums. I thought they were the most boring places in the world, and some of them still are,” Gray says.
Today he’s in charge of an extraordinarily well-received enterprise that offers alternative tours of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, as well as in Washington, DC, and San Francisco. On TripAdvisor, a Museum Hack tour at the Met is one of the highest-ranking things to do in New York City, with a five-star rating.
“There are three things that make a successful museum tour: guides, games and gossip,” says Gray, who believes today’s audiences have to be entertained before they can be educated. “We don’t hire guides based on whether they have a PhD in art history. The most important thing is that they’re great storytellers.”
Guides engage the group with games and activities, and the “gossip” comes from finding out fascinating and unusual facts – the “juicy backstories” – about the art.
“The tours are two or three times more fast-paced than an ordinary museum tour,” says Gray. “A lot of our target audience is in the ADD [attention deficit disorder] generation – always on their phones, always going from one thing to another. So that’s the kind of speed we maintain.”
Tours are conducted by guides who have designed their own unique routes through the museum, based on their own passions and interests. There are six or seven people in a group, and the price per person is $59 (£39, €54), including museum admission. At the Met, Museum Hack is registered with the Group Services office, in a similar way a foreign language tour guide would be.
Musuem Hack also offers teambuilding tours, family-friendly tours and tours for big groups like bachelorette parties. It works with museums around the world to do staff workshops and training programmes.
The company, which now has 24 employees and has hosted about 6,000 people on its tours, has been branching out into other areas and recently invited by a global sports company to train its staff in Musem Hack’s storytelling techniques.
The Hackers also worked recently with a newly renovated luxury heritage hotel in Times Square, the Knickerbocker.
“The Knickerbocker hired us to do their staff training. The hotel has all these crazy stories about Babe Ruth and the Titanic, for example. We trained their staff to be tour guides to tell these stories,” Gray says.
The business has come along way since Gray quit his job to focus on Museum Hack in July 2013. The definitive moment came a couple of years before that, when his opinion about museums was challenged.
“I was brought to the Met on a date,” he says. “The museum was empty and my date basically gave me a private tour, which unlocked a sense of curiosity about history and art that I never knew I had.”
Gray began touring his friends around the Met and soon his friends were bringing their friends. “Soon I was doing so many tours that I decided to establish a business.”
Now it’s about attracting Millennials. Gray says they have to be engaged at the speed and pace they’re used to – perhaps something the sector can learn from?
“Absolutely! I would love it if museums stole our ideas and put us out of business. I know that will never happen, but if they did steal our ideas then great. It’s important to engage fresh audiences with art.”
Read more from this issue of Attractions Management magazine
View contents of Attractions Management 2016 issue 1
Interview: Tony Butler
Tony Butler, executive director of Derby
Museums Trust, on how museums can
be a force for good in their communities
Attractions: Perfect Brew
At 15 years old, the Guinness Storehouse
has been voted Europe’s best-loved
attraction. Manager Paul Carty reveals
the secrets of the Dublin brandland
Profile: John McReynolds
IAAPA’s new chairman reveals his aims
for the year ahead, his vision for a
global association and how his role at
Universal Orlando informs his goals
Analysis: The Attractions Business
Business planning consultant
David Camp starts an exclusive eight-part
series, delving into the fine art of attractions
operation from a business perspective
Science Centres: How to Future-Proof a Science Centre
Peter Slavenburg of design agency
NorthernLight describes how invisible
technology, serious play, co-creation
and the digital experience will inform
the science centre of tomorrow
Promotional feature: Simworx Ventures
Simworx Ventures is bringing its expertise in cutting-edge media-based attractions
to a new audience of museums, heritage sites, zoos and aquariums
Technology: Beacons on the Horizon
Beacons have countless applications in
the world of attractions. A case study
from the Cleveland Museum of Art
illustrates the technology’s potential
Museums & Galleries: Art Attack
Some of the most exciting attractions
design is happening in new and
upcoming galleries around the world,
from firms like Kengo Kuma and BIG
Promotional feature: IDEA
2016 is shaping up to be an interesting year for the attractions industry.
IDEA looks at what it takes to win audiences and command attention
Mystery Shopper: Spring in Your Step
We disappear down the rabbit hole as we
pay a mystery shopper visit to Bounce
Below, a unique underground trampolining
attraction in Snowdonia, north Wales
Rides: The Ride Makers
Our ride makers series continues with
water rides, a firm favourite with park
guests. Three leading companies reveal
the latest trends in flumes and chutes
Technology: Tech Check
The industry technology unveiled at
IAAPA 2015: from VR to interactives, and
digital puppets to 20-storey LED giants
They’re museum tours for people who don’t like museums, and Nick Gray, founder of private museum tour company Museum Hack, was once one of those people.
“I used to hate museums. I thought they were the most boring places in the world, and some of them still are,” Gray says.
Today he’s in charge of an extraordinarily well-received enterprise that offers alternative tours of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, as well as in Washington, DC, and San Francisco. On TripAdvisor, a Museum Hack tour at the Met is one of the highest-ranking things to do in New York City, with a five-star rating.
“There are three things that make a successful museum tour: guides, games and gossip,” says Gray, who believes today’s audiences have to be entertained before they can be educated. “We don’t hire guides based on whether they have a PhD in art history. The most important thing is that they’re great storytellers.”
Guides engage the group with games and activities, and the “gossip” comes from finding out fascinating and unusual facts – the “juicy backstories” – about the art.
“The tours are two or three times more fast-paced than an ordinary museum tour,” says Gray. “A lot of our target audience is in the ADD [attention deficit disorder] generation – always on their phones, always going from one thing to another. So that’s the kind of speed we maintain.”
Tours are conducted by guides who have designed their own unique routes through the museum, based on their own passions and interests. There are six or seven people in a group, and the price per person is $59 (£39, €54), including museum admission. At the Met, Museum Hack is registered with the Group Services office, in a similar way a foreign language tour guide would be.
Musuem Hack also offers teambuilding tours, family-friendly tours and tours for big groups like bachelorette parties. It works with museums around the world to do staff workshops and training programmes.
The company, which now has 24 employees and has hosted about 6,000 people on its tours, has been branching out into other areas and recently invited by a global sports company to train its staff in Musem Hack’s storytelling techniques.
The Hackers also worked recently with a newly renovated luxury heritage hotel in Times Square, the Knickerbocker.
“The Knickerbocker hired us to do their staff training. The hotel has all these crazy stories about Babe Ruth and the Titanic, for example. We trained their staff to be tour guides to tell these stories,” Gray says.
The business has come along way since Gray quit his job to focus on Museum Hack in July 2013. The definitive moment came a couple of years before that, when his opinion about museums was challenged.
“I was brought to the Met on a date,” he says. “The museum was empty and my date basically gave me a private tour, which unlocked a sense of curiosity about history and art that I never knew I had.”
Gray began touring his friends around the Met and soon his friends were bringing their friends. “Soon I was doing so many tours that I decided to establish a business.”
Now it’s about attracting Millennials. Gray says they have to be engaged at the speed and pace they’re used to – perhaps something the sector can learn from?
“Absolutely! I would love it if museums stole our ideas and put us out of business. I know that will never happen, but if they did steal our ideas then great. It’s important to engage fresh audiences with art.”
Read more from this issue of Attractions Management magazine
View contents of Attractions Management 2016 issue 1
Interview: Tony Butler
Tony Butler, executive director of Derby
Museums Trust, on how museums can
be a force for good in their communities
Attractions: Perfect Brew
At 15 years old, the Guinness Storehouse
has been voted Europe’s best-loved
attraction. Manager Paul Carty reveals
the secrets of the Dublin brandland
Profile: John McReynolds
IAAPA’s new chairman reveals his aims
for the year ahead, his vision for a
global association and how his role at
Universal Orlando informs his goals
Analysis: The Attractions Business
Business planning consultant
David Camp starts an exclusive eight-part
series, delving into the fine art of attractions
operation from a business perspective
Science Centres: How to Future-Proof a Science Centre
Peter Slavenburg of design agency
NorthernLight describes how invisible
technology, serious play, co-creation
and the digital experience will inform
the science centre of tomorrow
Promotional feature: Simworx Ventures
Simworx Ventures is bringing its expertise in cutting-edge media-based attractions
to a new audience of museums, heritage sites, zoos and aquariums
Technology: Beacons on the Horizon
Beacons have countless applications in
the world of attractions. A case study
from the Cleveland Museum of Art
illustrates the technology’s potential
Museums & Galleries: Art Attack
Some of the most exciting attractions
design is happening in new and
upcoming galleries around the world,
from firms like Kengo Kuma and BIG
Promotional feature: IDEA
2016 is shaping up to be an interesting year for the attractions industry.
IDEA looks at what it takes to win audiences and command attention
Mystery Shopper: Spring in Your Step
We disappear down the rabbit hole as we
pay a mystery shopper visit to Bounce
Below, a unique underground trampolining
attraction in Snowdonia, north Wales
Rides: The Ride Makers
Our ride makers series continues with
water rides, a firm favourite with park
guests. Three leading companies reveal
the latest trends in flumes and chutes
Technology: Tech Check
The industry technology unveiled at
IAAPA 2015: from VR to interactives, and
digital puppets to 20-storey LED giants
OMA has completed a major transformation of New York's New Museum, creating a larger
cultural campus that combines expanded exhibition spaces with learning, performance,
hospitality and public programming.
A US$50 million (£44.2 million, €51.2 million) transformation of Chicago's historic McCormick
Mansion has created a new destination that combines live magic, immersive theatre, dining and
private membership under one roof.
The Montana Historical Society has officially celebrated the opening of its new Montana
Heritage
Center, a US$107 million (£79 million, €92 million) destination that combines immersive
storytelling with cutting-edge audiovisual technology to bring the sta
San Antonio Zoo has reported a US$283 million economic impact for 2025, following a decade-
long transformation programme that has seen almost US$200 million invested into the Texas
attraction.
Plans for the AU$180 million redevelopment of Reef HQ Aquarium in Townsville, Australia, are
progressing, with the project set to transform the attraction into a global centre for reef
education and conservation.
Abu Dhabi-based investment firm Mubadala Capital has made a binding, fully financed
€1 billion
offer to acquire Pierre and Vacances SA, the European holiday resort operator behind the
continental European Center Parcs business.
Disney has reaffirmed its commitment to investing US$30 billion in its US parks and cruise
business by 2033, using new America250 celebrations to underline the role its attractions play
in supporting jobs, tourism and economic growth.
Expo 2030 Riyadh is being planned as a permanent visitor destination, with organisers
confirming the six-million-square-metre site will become a Global Village after the event closes.
The owner of one of Australia's best-known waterparks has acquired a major competitor,
creating a new attractions business spanning two of the country's largest visitor destinations.
The Toverland theme park in the Netherlands has announced a €98m expansion programme
that will add a resort, new attractions and staff facilities as it pursues plans to become a multi-
day destination.
+ More news
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