APPAREL A Fun Way to Enhance a Visit for Guests Offering Apparel

at Museum Stores

By Carimé Lane

The success of a piece of clothing at a museum store depends on a variety of factors: the popularity of the associated exhibit, price point, quality of the clothing and creativity that went into the making of the apparel, among other things.

Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) is a unique museum in the sense that they don’t have a permanent collection, explained Phyllis Criddle, director of retail operations at MASS MoCA. They have both long and short term exhibitions. All of their apparel is either based on one of these rotating exhibitions or logo-branded explained Criddle.

In general, their apparel is a great category for their shop. Sales will fluctuate with the popularity of an exhibition. “The more well known the artist, the more highly sought after the items in the shop,” commented Criddle.

The size of the store has changed drastically over the past several years, said Criddle. “It grew and then shrunk with COVID and still remains relatively small,” Criddle added. The lobby of the museum is large and shared between retail, café and box office, which allows for this fluctuation in size.

They experienced very robust pre-pandemic sales. After re-opening, they were much slower than they were accustomed to being. But since last summer, they’ve been seeing sales figures rising above pre-pandemic levels. Some months have been their best-to-date, said Criddle.

The majority of the apparel they sell are screen-printed T-shirts. They don’t produce many digitally printed products. Criddle said she is normally not satisfied with the end result.

“Screen printing is usually the way we go,” expressed Criddle.

They also offer sweatshirts and embroidered hats. They emphasize ethically-produced and locally created garments. According to Criddle, everything is screenprinted locally in a small business in Scheffield, Mass. In future, Criddle is interested in branching away from those items and into some more unique and unusual garments in the future.

The apparel associated with the most well-known/ popular artists that drew visits into the museum in the first place are their best-sellers, said Criddle. “Guests want something in hand to remind them of their visit,” she added.

In terms of apparel type, T-shirts sell the best. This can be explained by the accessible price point, said Criddle. The majority of the T-shirts are $28, but they range in price depending on the age group targeted –children’s T-shirts are less, for example. But items with a higher cost of production – as in long-sleeves or baseball style tees – will be pricier.

At $66 for crew neck sweatshirts and $78 for zip hoodies, sweatshirts are the higher range apparel they stock. They don’t create many sweatshirts based on exhibitions. Instead, most of them are decorated with the museum logo.

At the Titanic Museum Attractions in Branson, Mo., Pigeon Forge, Tenn., and their online store, every piece of casual wear, such as T-shirts, caps and hoodies are custom made. They feature either a real image of the Titanic story, replicas of vintage posters, or custom de-