MAAA | Programs | Prof. Development | Texas | HELP

The Gregg County Historical Museum is the oldest historical preservation institution in Gregg County. Located since 1984 in an historic bank building in downtown Longview, the museum is dedicated to preserving the discovery, history, and continuing development of Gregg County. The Museum provides educational programs for children, and collaborates with heritage organizations and the community by providing special exhibits and programs, which establish continuity of the past and present. Permanent exhibits at the museum highlight farming, oil, railroads, schools and businesses and families of the area.

Year 2 | Year 3

Goals for Year 3
In year 3 of Texas HELP, the Gregg County Historical Museum will focus on marketing and pr as their area of training. They’ve met with consultant Seth Davidson and drafted their list of marketing goals. They plan to start their marketing work by creating a press kit including information about the museum, as well as tourist destinations in Longview. They also intend to update their website, adding pages about exhibitions, events, museum news, and an educational page with downloadable lesson plans for museum visits. A new emphasis will be placed on developing new markets and bringing and targeting community groups through mailings.

Year 3:
Rags to Riches: Handcrafted Rugs

Goals:
The Gregg County Historical Museum was a newcomer to Texas HELP in year three, but wasted no time getting up to speed on their list of goals. Working with marketing and PR consultant Seth Davidson, the museum decided to focus on developing a press kit, using their database to create targeted mailings, updating their Web site, and developing a strong new message for the museum, that will provide visitors will a compelling reason to visit.

Accomplishments:
Museum director Ginia Northcutt was very proactive about reaching their goals for the year. Seth encouraged her to try new marketing techniques and for the first time the museum collaborated with the LMFA on an ad in the local newspaper. They added a number of new names to their potential member database, and then used those names to solicit members and to send newsletters to. The museum’s annual living history Christmas event was a huge success as a result of their marketing efforts. Ginia wrote in her exhibition final evaluation that the experience stretched the museum staff in terms of installation as well and they learned much about the installation process.

Improvements:

• Museum visitation increased by 58%

• Attendance to the annual living history Christmas event doubled by extending hours for four weekends during the holidays

• A targeted mailing to the Longview Opera’s mailing list resulted in an additional $7,000 in donations to the museum

Goals for Year 4: Apron Strings: Ties to the Past
In year four, the Gregg County Historical museum will focus on fundraising and development as their area of training. They intend to take a long-term, major giving approach to fundraising. They are in the unique position amongst the Texas HELP museums in that their immediate financial needs are met by the current budget. This will allow them to take a more in-depth look at the future of the museum. The goals they have set include developing a “leave behind” brochure on endowments and planned giving, initiating new fundraising special events, and securing funds for major capital needs (i.e. elevator, roof, new computers). They will be working with consultant Scott Cooksey on meeting these goals.

Goals

In year four of Texas HELP, the Gregg County Historical Museum focused on fundraising and development. Fundraising is a particular strong suit of director Ginia Northcutt, and she worked on her goals with aplomb. After meeting with consultant Scott Cooksey, Ginia decided her number one goal was to create a planned giving brochure for the museum. She also wanted a supplementary printed piece that could be used in soliciting education grants. Capital improvements were on her list of things to tackle for the year as well. A campaign was planned to raise money for a new roof and to purchase a new computer system. Inspired by the success of her HELP colleagues, Ginia also wanted to try her hand at a special event fundraiser.

Accomplishments:

Using her $500 HELP grant, Ginia worked with a local designer and printer who offered a significant discount to produce the planned giving brochure. This was the goal that she was most proud of achieving since the brochure will be a very important fundraising tool for the museum.

Plans had also been in the works to install an elevator in the museum, but when the bid came in at $800,000, they decided that the money would be best spent on other improvements.

Also in year four, the museum attempted its first "event fundraiser" with a murder-mystery dinner theater. Although it was successful, and they raised $2,700, staff felt that the time and energy required for special event fundraising is enormous and was less effective than if they had spent the same time and energy making direct solicitations. The museum did raise enough money to replace the roof this year.

Also, their HELP exhibition, Apron Strings: Ties to the Past was a great success. They created a strong local tie-in by photographing 30 Longview business people in their aprons and including them in their exhibition.

Improvements:

• Printed a planned giving piece to increase long-term donations to the museum

• Completed a murder-mystery dinner theater fundraiser

• Raised $125,000 for a new roof from the Crain Foundation of Longview

• Incorporated local business people into their HELP exhibition

• Received a $1,000 individual donation to subsidize expense of busing students to the museum