We’re All in Entertainment

A conversation with fan-of-the-podcast C.B. inspired me to finish a longstanding half-done article.

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[Looks furtively around, then whispers:]

We’re all in entertainment.

Sure, we may say we’re in education.

Or we’re in preservation of material heritage.

Or we’re in advocacy.

But exhibitions — call them experiences or whatever you like — are the core reason most of our visitors visit. We are “visited destinations”. A dispassionate outside business analyst would categorize us as “location-based entertainment”.

Among paid experiences, that’s a category that includes theme parks, escape rooms, retailtainment and eater-taiment.

Among unpaid experiences, that category includes walks in the park, festivals and window shopping.

That’s because “entertainment” means anything that we do with “leisure time” outside of jobs or school, and family obligations.

Here’s the thing:
Our visitors might not be coming for the thing we think.

That doesn’t mean we should give them whatever they want. We can only give what we’ve got. But if we want them to come back, or tell their friends, we have to start by understanding why they came. And it’s probably not why we think. 

[Looks furtively around, then whispers again:]

We’re all in entertainment.

Warmly,
Jonathan