In the course of the fall semester, the N.C. Museum of Dolls, Toys & Miniatures collaborated with three diverse classes in the Ralph W. Ketner University of Organization at Catawba College or university — introduction to entrepreneurship, advertising and marketing study, and the MBA study course promoting management, programs taught by Dr. Jeremiah Nelson and Dr. Jennifer Yurchisin.
“The college students had so many excellent ideas,” reflected Beth Nance, government director of the museum, pursuing company approach shows at the finish of the semester in Nelson’s introduction to entrepreneurship.
Positioned in Spencer, the museum gives site visitors exhibits ranging from antique dolls and toys to modern day childhood favorites. Right after checking out the museum early on in the semester, learners remarked that the museum really has a thing for everybody — not just die-tricky collectors or modest little ones. There is plainly a lot of untapped probable for increasing the audience to boost visitor traffic.
Teams of students highlighted mixtures of operational techniques, partnership concepts, and advertising tactics that they felt would positively impression the visitor experience or create new customer interest. A single crew proposed “pop up” displays at retailers, group facilities, and even other museums to generate recognition at possibly no price tag to a extremely precise audience. Various teams pointed out the options of promotion on social media, considering the fact that it is extremely spending plan-pleasant and can be incredibly specific primarily based on demographics. Also, the probable for free of charge engagement with distinct teams applying hashtags would deliver awareness among specialized niche lovers. A single pupil pointed out that lots of Tiktok posts with #miniatures have additional than a million views.
The entrepreneurship college students truly received energized about the challenge. McKenzie Webster, a junior majoring in biology, found acquiring the company approach to be an thrilling challenge. She shared that “trying to find a way for the museum to make improvements to without the need of it dropping its character was my group’s leading priority.” Marko Sudar, a freshman laptop or computer science key, agreed. He noticed, “This was a really enjoyable journey and my team was definitely joyful to be a part of it. Locating what is specific about the museum and discovering techniques it can stand out between museums and other amusement choices challenged us to implement what we uncovered in class.”
“I think doing work with a real client and owning the opportunity to develop a enterprise system for a serious small business was a unique and over-all astounding experience” remarked Harmony Speer, a Catawba College sophomore majoring in small business administration and sociology. “We took what we figured out in the classroom and used it to a serious-lifestyle condition in the moment. This expertise was a person-of-a-type and a terrific learning knowledge that went perfectly with the subject areas lined in class.”
In Yurchisin’s advertising and marketing management program, pupils recognized concentrate on marketplaces and done a SWOT evaluation of the museum, building a listing of ideas for marketing products and functions. In her undergraduate advertising and marketing study program, a team of pupils done a demographic and psychographic profile of the museum’s visitors.
Dr. Eric Hake, dean of the Ketner University of Business enterprise pointed out, “Every semester, school in just the Ralph W. Ketner School of Company collaborate with area corporations to coordinate classroom-based mostly investigation to serve the desires of our students and our neighborhood. Task-based finding out is an important complement to individualized business internships, the two of which combine class-area theory with fingers on useful apps.”
To discover methods you can operate with business enterprise pupils and faculty at Catawba University, make contact with Dr. Eric Hake at erhake@catawba.edu.
