Sunflowers' Souvenirs: Exploring the Effect of Visitor Engagement on Museum Shop Retail

Abstract

Museums increasingly rely on souvenir sales to generate revenue and enhance visitor experiences. This paper explores the relationship between visitor engagement and souvenir purchasing behavior in museum shops, offering insights for managing experiential retail. We introduce two theoretical measures to capture visitor engagement: interaction draw, which reflects the breadth of engagement through the artwork's capacity to spark curiosity and attract visitors; and interaction immersion, which captures the depth of engagement through the visitor's emotional and cognitive absorption, measured by interaction duration. Collaborating with the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, we leverage visitor movement logs and shop sales records to develop a hierarchical choice model that captures visitors' two-stage decision-making process: selecting which museum shop to visit, then deciding which product to purchase. Empirical analyses, conducted at the aggregate artwork level, employ exogenous layout changes and an instrumental variable approach to address endogeneity concerns. Results show interaction draw significantly boosts sales quantity and revenue, while immersion strongly increases quantity, demonstrating engagement's impact on souvenir sales. Interestingly, per visitor immersion's U-shaped effect on revenue suggests brief interactions may not foster connections, but extended engagement leads to significant purchases. We also investigate how museum layout decisions and artwork significance cues affect souvenir sales. Through counterfactual analyses, we explore strategies for optimizing museum shop and souvenir design. Our research provides a foundation for informed decision-making in museum retail, contributing to their long-term viability.

Keywords: Revenue management, Service operations, Experiential retail, Souvenirs, People-centric operations, Cultural operations