Data Cuts, Broader Population Comparison, & Current Participants
When you sign up for the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, you receive data on your museum and how it compares to the field at-large.
When at least five museums of the same type or geographic location (city or state) sign up for the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers, you may also receive additional comparative data cuts, giving you even more benchmarking data.
Below were the data cuts for 2025. The list for 2026 will be updated when it’s available.
By Museum Type
In 2025, we provided data cuts for:
Children’s/Youth Museums
Natural History Museums
Science/Technology Centers
General Museums
Botanic Gardens/Arboreta
Museums with significant Indigenous Belongings
Multi-Disciplinary Museums
Anthropology
Nature Center/Preserve
African American Museums
Religious (Art or History)
Social Justice Museums
Zoos/Aquariums (2 more needed)
Air and Space (3 more needed)
Art Museums, including by:
Regional Art Museums
College or University Art Museums
Contemporary Art Museums
Encyclopedic Art Museums
Decorative Arts
Design Museums (2 more needed)
History-related museums, including by:
Historic Sites
Historic Houses
Outdoor History Museums
City History Museums
State History Museums
Estates/Mansions
Local History/Historical Society
Historic Sites of Enslavement
Industrial History
Revolutionary War/Founding of the US
Maritime History
Presidential Museums/Sites
Military History (1 more needed)
By Governance:
Academic
Municipal (city/county)
State (state/province)
By Location
In 2025, we provided data cuts for:
Arizona
Southern California
Colorado
Illinois
Massachusetts
Michigan
North Carolina
Texas
Virginia
Washington
Chicago
Denver
Seattle metro area
Washington, DC
Upstate New York
Missouri
Phoenix
Northern California
Connecticut
Miami & West Palm
Dallas-Fort Worth
North Carolina (1 more museum needed)
Pennsylvania (1 more museum needed)
Florida (2 more museums needed)
By Budget
In 2025, we provided data cuts for:
$400,000 – $1 million, with additional cuts by:
Art museums/centers
Historic sites
History museums
Historic houses
Local historical societies (1 more needed)
City History Museums (1 more needed)
$1.1 million – $5 million, with additional cuts by:
Art museums
University/College Art Museums
Regional Art Museums
Contemporary Art Museums
Historic House Museums
History Museums
City History Museums/Centers
Science Centers
Natural History
Children’s/Youth Museum
Estates/Mansions
Historic Sites (1 more museum needed)
$5.1 million – $10 million, with additional cuts by:
Art Museums
Regional Art Museums
History Museums
Science Centers
Natural History
Children’s/Youth Museum
Contemporary Art Museums
Estate or Mansion
Historic Sites
Historic Houses (2 more museums needed)
Local Historical Societies (2 more museums needed)
Greater than $10 million, with additional cuts by:
Art Museums
Encyclopedic Art Museums
Regional Art Museums
Contemporary Art Museums
History Museums
Natural History Museums
Science Centers
Children’s/Youth Museum
Anthropology
Estates or Mansions
Historic Houses (1 more museum needed)
Historic Sites (1 more museum needed)
City History Museums (1 more needed)
State History Museums (1 more needed)
Broader Population Comparison
Broader population sampling collects data from casual visitors and non-visitors in your city or state. When you think of your museum and your local population, there are three main groups of people:
Frequent visitors
Potential Annual Survey of Museum-Goers respondents; typically your repeat visitors and/or members.
Casual visitors
Potential broader population sampling respondent; someone who may visit once a year, or every couple of years.
Non-visitors
Potential broader population sampling respondent; someone who has never visited or hasn’t visited in many years.
By adding on Broader Population Sampling in your area, you can create a more complete picture of who does and doesn’t engage with your museum, as well as their values, attitudes, and behaviors. This can then help you develop a more informed audience engagement strategy to broaden audiences.
About Broader Population Sampling
The Survey: Because we want to ask the same questions of all population segments, we create a survey that is nearly identical to the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers. The main difference is that since we can’t assume respondents have visited your museum, we don’t ask them to assess the visitor experience at your museum. Instead, they are asked about leisure-time activities and more general attitudes towards museums and lifelong learning.
Identifying casual visitors from non-visitors: The survey includes a question asking about visitation at local attractions, including your museum. We use this question to identify your casual visitors and your non-visitors. (This also tells you the other places and organizations you’re competing with for leisure time and educational activities.)
The sample: We purchase the sample from our survey vendor, Alchemer. They do a great job filling samples with a demographic mix that is typically pretty close to the broader population in a state or metro area, including by race and ethnicity and educational attainment.
The geographic area: We can offer this for either an individual metro area or by state. If you are in a small city or rural area, we may have to do it by state, but we’ll discuss this with you and only field the survey if you agree with this decision.
Reporting: Wilkening Consulting will include the broader population results in your reports. For your results spreadsheet, this includes directly comparing your frequent visitors, casual visitors, and non-visitors. On your slide deck results, the broader population results will be visually represented as one of your comps.
Cost: There are two factors that affect the cost–the cost of purchasing the sample itself and the time of Wilkening Consulting staff to extensively customize your reports to include your local broader population comparison. The base fee of $2,000 includes the extra reporting and the sample fee for 250 respondents (this is in addition to your Annual Survey participation fee).
Adding respondents: If you want a sample of more than 250, you can do so for the cost of procuring the sample (our reporting fee doesn’t change). We’ll know in January what it will cost but we estimate $3.50-$4.00 per completed response.
Partnering with other area museums: If multiple museums in a metro area or state wish to field the broader population sampling, the sampling fee can be split among all of them (also enabling you to get a larger, more robust sample). The portion of your fee that covers reporting ($1,000) remains unchanged. It is strongly encouraged that this partnering take place prior to fielding the broader population sample to ensure the possibility of sampling fee-splitting.
Custom questions: We may be able to include the custom questions you select for the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers into your broader population sample. It depends on whether those questions are appropriate for respondents who may have never visited your museum.
2025 Participants
Allen County Museum
Anchorage Museum
Anderson Abruzzo Albuquerque International Balloon Museum
Applewood Estate/ Ruth Mott Foundation
Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts
Armstrong Air & Space Museum (Ohio History Connection)
Arts & Education at the Hoyt
Baltimore Museum of Art
Bishop Museum
Blanton Museum of Art
Boca Raton Museum of Art
Bolinas Museum
Broad Discovery Center
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Buffalo Museum of Science
Burchfield Penney Art Center
Burke Museum
Capitol Modern (Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts)
Carnegie Arts Center
Chandler Museum
Charlotte Museum of History
Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum
Chicago Children’s Museum
Chicago History Museum
Chicago Zoological Society (Brookfield Zoo Chicago)
Children’s Museum of Phoenix
Chrysler Museum of Art
Cincinnati Art Museum
Cincinnati Museum Center
Cleveland Museum of Natural History
Clyfford Still Museum
Colorado Railroad Museum
Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum
Columbus Museum of Art
Conner Prairie Museum
Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens
CuriOdyssey
Denver Art Museum
Denver Botanic Gardens
Denver Museum of Nature & Science
Desert Botanical Garden
Detroit Historical Society (Detroit Historical Museum & Dossin Great Lakes Museum)
Discovery Museum
Drayton Hall Preservation Trust (National Trust for Historic Preservation site)
Economy Museum at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis
Edith Farnsworth House Historic Site (National Trust for Historic Preservation site)
El Museo del Barrio
Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University
Emily Dickinson Museum
Exploration Place
Exploratorium
Fernbank Museum
Field Museum
Ford House
Fort Ancient Earthworks and Nature Preserve (Ohio History Connection)
Four Mile Historic Park
Franklin G. Burroughs – Simeon B. Chapin Art Museum
Franklin Park Conservatory
Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art
Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park
Frontier Culture Museum of Virginia
Frye Art Museum
Ganna Walska: Lotusland
George Eastman Museum
George Washington’s Mount Vernon
Glensheen Mansion
Grand Rapids Art Museum
Great Circle (Newark Earthworks -Ohio History Connection)
Great Lakes Science Center
Greeley History Museum
Greenwich Historical Society
Gregg Museum of Art & Design
Gunston Hall
Henry Art Gallery
Heritage Museum and Gardens
High Desert Museum
Historic Mesquite, Inc. (Opal Lawrence Historical Park and/or Florence Ranch Homestead)
Historic St. Mary’s City
Historical Society of Cheshire County
History Nebraska (Nebraska State Historical Society)
Honolulu Museum of Art
Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites
International Spy Museum
Japanese American National Museum
Journey Museum
Kalamazoo Institute of Arts
Kentucky Historical Society
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
Litchfield Historical Society
Littleton Museum
Longmont Museum
Marshall M. Fredericks Sculpture Museum
Maryland Center for History and Culture
McDonald Observatory
Meadows Museum
Miami Children’s Museum
Milwaukee County Historical Society
Minnesota Historical Society
Minnetrista
Mississippi Museum of Art
Monmouth Museum
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts
Monticello (Thomas Jefferson Fdn)
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles
Museum of Discovery & Science (MODS)
Museum of Early Trades & Crafts
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Museum of Northern Arizona
Museum of Sonoma County
Museum of the American Revolution
Museum of Us
Mystic Seaport Museum
Naper Settlement
NASCAR Hall of Fame
National Afro-American Museum & Cultural Center (Ohio History Connection)
National Hispanic Cultural Center Art Museum
National Museum of Bermuda
National Museum of Mexican Art
National Museum of the Pacific War (Admiral Nimitz Foundation)
National Nordic Museum
National Susan B. Anthony Museum & House
National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
Natural History Museum of Utah
New York Botanical Garden
Newark Museum of Art
Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art, Utah State University
Norskedalen Nature & Heritage Center
North Carolina Museum of Art
Norton Museum
Office of Historic Alexandria (Historic Alexandria Museums)
Ohio History Center (Ohio History Connection)
Old Sturbridge Village
Omaha Children’s Museum
Peabody Essex Museum
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Pittock Mansion
Raclin Murphy Museum of Art
Roger Tory Peterson Institute
Rogers Historical Museum
Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library & Museums (Ohio History Connection)
Saint Louis Art Museum
San Bernardino County Museum
San Diego History Center
San Diego Natural History Museum
Science Center of Iowa
Science Museum Oklahoma
Seattle Children’s Museum
Serpent Mound (Ohio History Connection)
Shelton McMurphey Johnson House
SHU Discovery Science Center & Planetarium (Sacred Heart University)
Skirball Cultural Center
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian
Smithsonian National Museum of American History
South Carolina State Museum
Space Center Houston
Springfield Museum of Art
Stanley Museum of Art (University of Iowa)
Tempe History Museum
Texas Science & Natural History Museum
The Dalí Museum
The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art
The Franklin Institute
The Frick Pittsburgh
The Friends of Iolani Palace
The Gamble House Conservancy
The Gardens on Spring Creek
The Glass House (National Trust for Historic Preservation)
The Henry Ford
The Museum of Flight
The Museum of Russian Art
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
The Perot Museum of Nature and Science
The Phillips Collection
The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza
The Tech Interactive
The Valentine
The Walters Art Museum
Two Mississippi Museums
University of Colorado Museum of Natural History
University of Michigan Museum of Natural History
University of Nebraska State Museum
Venice Museum
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
Virginia Museum of History & Culture
Vizcaya Museum and Gardens
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art
Warren G. Harding Presidential Museum (Ohio History Connection)
Washington State Historical Society
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History
Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West
Whatcom Museum
Winterthur Museum, Garden, and Library
Witte Museum
WonderLab Museum
Woodland Park Zoo
Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House (National Trust for Historic Preservation site)
Worcester Art Museum
World Chess Hall of Fame
York County History Center
Participant stories
Browse the stories of those who have participated in the Annual Survey of Museum-Goers and learn how they applied the data in practice.
Data Stories
Check out the data stories from previous years’ surveys covering themes from masking in museums to how to spark curiosity among visitors.
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