
Following the New Museum’s acclaimed Chris O’Fili exhibition, museum leadership recognized an opportunity to leverage exhibitions through exclusive limited edition artist collaborations and the increasingly blurred lines of commerce and culture. The result: a focus on a compelling retail experience that would foster community within the arts and, through its membership, with the museum.
The triangulation of museum attendance, membership and retail (visit – join – shop)
At the time that netamorphosis was brought on board at the New Museum, the New Museum’s store was known for cutting edge, artist-led product, the kind that you’d expect on the shelves of the only NYC museum dedicated to contemporary art. The store benefited from one of the highest revenue per square FT rates in museum retail in the United States; however, with finite physical capacity in the lobby dedicated to retail, combined with what would traditionally be considered an ‘unbalanced’ product assortment, structured around shorter exhibition product opportunities and without a permanent collection, the exhibition calendar presented an adverse affect on visitor revenue streams when the museum was closed. With this context in mind, neta created a strategy that would allow for year-round sales away from 235 Bowery. Our strategy centered around a re-platforming of the newmuseumstore.org eCommerce website, a prioritization of membership benefits throughout the user experience and maximizing the physical store’s square footage productivity through a re-fixturing within the museum’s lobby.