The Thanet Star

7 things that are needed to save the Turner Centre

With a projected minimum cost per head of £5.77 just for staff costs the Turner Centre is looking like an unlikely project. As a businessman let's consider what I would want to see happen to feel that my investment was safe.

1. The works of Turner or something very close. This is a vital aim. For me to put my money behind such a project (assuming I had any to put behind it) I would want to see a full time Turner expert heading up the team whose job it is to arrange for articles of Turners work to return "home". For this there would need to be a number of arts patrons to cover the costs. The only other option would be to have a centre that teaches artists to paint exceedingly good imitations.

2. Purple Cow. Assuming that all Art Galleries are regular cows this would need to be a Purple Cow. This could be the way in which the Europe's top art talents are drawn to Thanet (and with them the fans) or some other remarkable ellement that is core to the gallery. After all the ideal visitor count is a minimum of 500,000 and that means that the gallery itself from inception needs to worth travelling a long way to see. People should be considering taking a long weekend form all as far away as Tokyo, New York and Sidney just to look at it. Currently you'd be hard pressed to get people to cross the (now smaller) road for it.

3. New artists works for sale. I would also be looking to see a team made up of those skilled at selling works of art. These would head up a regular specialist auction house which should run from the centre. This turnover in works of art and sales (with commissions) would earn an income that could hope to pay some of the running costs of the business. Ideally it should draw more artists to the area cementing the centres reputation as something special.


4. 500,000 plus visitors a year. Thats a little under 2,000 people on every weekday of the year with special events topping 5,000. The projcted visitor count of 130,000 is hardly more than the population of Thanet and only 8% tp 15% are likely to ever bother to visit. This means that the population of Thanet again needs to visit to get the current count but to be profitable we need to get to 3 to 4 times the areas population each year. (I'd also like to know the capacity of the venue.)

5. High class or high cost membership only events and sections. Let's face it art is a high money issue. Therefore to make money I might want to have an exclusive £5,000 a year subscription service to make the sponsors and patrons feel good about handing over their cash. At present you might get fifty quid off of a few people but this is because there is no attraction value built into the project. As an investor I'd expect to see profits that are worth talking about.

6. High earnings. Based on current visitor estimates the centre needs to take an average of £24 per person to be a valid business with potential to grow. Without this it must get the sponsorship of a minimum of three additional arts patrons (aside from those helping us get the Turner works). I'd be looking to see the figure be nearer £5 per head plus other earnings. Whatever the centre is doing if it is not raking in cash it is doing it wrong. Lots of cash in means lots of spending out and this means a good economy locally which will support a higher class of visitor staying more than a few hours and so more cash... As an investor this also is what I'd want.

7. Less staff, more stuff. Let's be honest the staffing levels are all wrong. Too much "dream team" and box ticking and less focus on the bottom line. If you can tell me how a formal learning officer and an informal learning officer help the centre earn money they're off the team. Unless a memebr of staff can be justified as part of the money making process (PR, Guides, teachers or whatever helps with this core mission) then they are costing me profits. I see too many role

Furl Newsvine Spurl.net reddit Tailrank del.icio.us BlinkList linkaGoGo Shadows Simpy digg kinja Magnolia Squidoo Technorati Yahoo My Web AskJeeves Google Windows Live Favorites

Think you can do better? · read more items categorised Thanet · Don't miss a thing: Subscribe Today · Help: what's a feed? · This site is operated on set principles of policy and disclosure read them here

Public Comments

Paul Hogwood wrote:

Pray tell me where are all these visitors going to park their vehicles, This question was brought up at the public meeting. They did not have an answer then and I do not believe they have one now.
A further point that was brought up at the time, was the use of opaque glass as the cladding for the building. Oh Boy will the local vandals have fun with that.
27/06/2009 18:23:33

Matt B wrote:

Those are some good questions. If it were my business I'd want an answer before I started. The easist solution (assuming some very agreeable land owners) would be to set up a shuttle of a suitably arty type with the station and the carpark at one end and the Art Centre and Old Town at the other.

That does leave the question as to who would park in that car park or what you might want to see in old town but that's another story.
29/06/2009 11:53:25

Add Comment

Please note that while email addresses may be given via this form they are not shown to anyone but the editor. This change is retrospective and has hidden all email addresses so that people wishing anonymity may have it.

This item is closed, it's not possible to add new comments to it or to vote on it

If you have a blog or other website of your own leaving the URL in this form will create a "do follow" link for Joined Up Blogging at the top of your comment.

Supporting Thanet traders

The following ebay listings are largely from Thanet based members (although items with a strong Thanet theme may also be included).

 

Tweets from @thanetstar

ThanetStar.com - TDC to dump Thanet's poor to save four jobs http://bit.ly/dgABA2
2010-09-01T13:13:14Z
ThanetStar.com - A week in Thanet http://bit.ly/adPWPx
2010-08-31T12:14:46Z

Thanet Star's (old) Microblog

 Get Microblog by feed

Thanet's only microblog - tiny wee blog posts from Thanet.

Stock Market Seminars

If you fancy using money to make money you might be interested in some Free Stock Market Seminars in Kent. Okay so there are none in Thanet right now but follow K2A Guy and be the first to find out when there is.

No spam today, thank you.

Any more losers posting as Oes Tsetnoc for this lame SEO/Spam contest are going to get a full letter of complaint to their ISP.

Comment Feed

I could have sworn this was available already. RSS Comments Feed for the main blog.

Recent Comments

Kasey says Well - they learned from the American WalMart, didn't they? Undercut the...

Matt B says What Lib Dem vote? At the last election for the council Lib Dem's got no seats at...

Matt B says Well, when you put it like that...

Sir Head says what do you mean "Has tesco turned evil" have you forgotten how many...

Steve says Pretty sad the way humans have overrun the earth and can't leave beautiful and...

Naughty User says [Naughty IP: 222.124.32.167] Everywhere is going to recession, even in UK.

Matt says This is dreadful news! Surely it can't really be happening, we must start a petition!

jonney says it will be interesting to see what the results end up being. Will the coalition make...

Get the latest comments by feed

Thanet Finder: Search Thanet

Thanet Finder is Thanet's search engine created by people like me and you.



The following links area provided as is. Thanet Star is not responsible for the content of third party sites.

Additional Points of Presence

Technology Tips

Keep safe online with an anti-virus, firewall and malware protection. I can recomend F-Secure Internet Security 2010

Compatable inks can save you money click here for ink cartridges with free delivery (UK ONLY)


Blog Like a Pro

You need 3 things to host your own blog

  1. A host
  2. Some software
  3. A domain name

Web Host

You can pick up web hosting from £1.99 and have the freedom to do it your own way.

Blog Software (free)

Combine your low cost hosting with no cost software.

Domain

The domain name (such as www.thanetstar.com) is how people find you: Get your domain here (from me)

Contact Matt

If you would like to chat with Thanet Star's Editor Matt B then a number of options are available to you. (You can also leave a message).

If you have a twitter.com account (which is free) you might like to @ThanetStar.

If you are a skype user you can chat live whenever he is online. The indicator below shows when Matt is on Skype. Am I online with skype:

You can also get hold of him on Yahoo IM, MSN IM and GTalk if you know how. However, the screen name(s) he uses on these services are not public.

Connect with Matt on twitter as @thanetstar

Talk with Matt on facebook

Matthew Brown's Facebook Profile



The "Name" saga:

Who is Matthew Brown?

On being Matthew Brown