Visitor & non visitor research, Cutty Sark

Client: The Cutty Sark Trust

Dates: 2001-03

Budget: n/a

Project: Visitor & non visitor research

The Cutty Sark Trust wanted baseline data to better understand who their visitors were, their motivations, behaviour and satisfaction and to understand the barriers which stopped other visitors in Greenwich not visiting.

I worked with the Director and Fundraiser to develop surveys which we rolled out for 3 years and at the end of each year’s research wrote a summary report which provided a robust set of data which was then used to support a Heritage Lottery Fund application for the restoration of the Cutty Sark.

In the 2003 survey we tested a new scale for measuring motivations and satisfaction drawing on the extant literature, piloting the items with marketing experts and then rolling out the scale as part of the visitor survey.

It was extremely effective so I then tested it at the National Gallery to see if it was transferable to a gallery context which it was. In 2007 the development of the scale and findings from that survey were published in an academic journal which has been widely cited since.