The most visited tourist attraction in Texas is The Alamo. Located in the heart of San Antonio, this iconic attraction is managed by the Daughters of the Republic of Texas (DRT). Annual visitation hovers around three million, and it is not uncommon to see long lines of people waiting to visit.
There is no admission fee to enter The Alamo. Nor does The Alamo receive subsidies from any level of government. Maintaining this historic attraction is dependent upon both donations, as well as the ability of the DRT to generate revenue from services provided to visitors. Rental of an audio tour to visitors represents a critical component of the Alamo’s revenue generation mix.
When Tour-Mate first entered into discussions with The Alamo, it was offering visitors an audio tour provided by another entity. This other entity provided the equipment and had created the tour content. Additionally,it also controlled rental pricing, as well as audio tour sales and distribution. The Alamo indicated that it was unhappy with this third party’s sales effort, and the revenue that was being generated to help The Alamo fund on-going operations.
Changing audio tour providers would mean more than simply swapping out hardware. Upon examination, The Alamo discovered that it did not have complete ownership of its tour content. As such, a change to a different hardware provider would likely entail creation of new tour content in multiple languages. While Alamo curatorial and education staff were willing and able to write new tour content, there was no budget for translation services and tour production in multiple languages.
Tour-Mate created a multi-year package for The Alamo that included the provision of translation and production services, provision of our SC550 random access, multilingual audio tour hardware, and a combination of on-site and depot equipment service. Control of audio tour distribution as well as rental pricing decisions were handed over to The Alamo. Their success at revenue generation is now a function of its own efforts and not those of a third party.
As a result of the package created by Tour-Mate, ownership of all tour productions will reside with The Alamo. We further empowered this client by providing them with software and training which enabled The Alamo to change its tour content at will. While Tour-Mate stands ready and able to provide future content creation services to The Alamo, The Alamo is free to create content in whatever manner that best fulfills its long term objectives.