Cultural business models: the mistake of obsoletion

Arts and cultural organisations operate in fast changing, challenging and competitive environment. Majority of them have faced, in last decades, a down turning trend in public funding, pressure to be more entrepreneurial, increasing demand for digitalization and other challenges. Therefore, in order to thrive, arts and cultural organisations need to review and innovate their business models, step outside of their comfort zone and develop new activities. The aim of this chapter is to provide overview of business models of arts and cultural institutions, their innovation and emphasis is placed on how to avoid a mistake of adopting obsolete business models by arts and cultural organisations. After a theoretical framework, two successful cases are presented, the Egyptian Museum in Turin and the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Through semi-structured interviews with the Director of the Egyptian Museums and the Managing Director of the Van Gogh Museums, it is identified how these institutions have dealt with challenges, what drove them to innovate their business models, how they have gone through this process and why they have succeeded.