Are museum/park memberships worth it?

amother

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 9:49 am

Dh and I have been going back and forth on this. Sundays are really difficulr and we usually end up letting the kids veg out in front of videos and then we feel super guilty about it. Even when the weather is nice, there's only so much of the day you can spend at the park. Our local library has no Sunday hours. We live in the five boroughs, so theoretically there should be tons to do. We never end up going anywhere, usually because dh decides tickets and parking and incidentals just add up to too much. So I started looking into membership options, and if we take the lowest or second lowest option, we'd be paying (depending on the organization) somewhere between $80-$125 per YEAR to have free admission for our family, free or sharply discounted parking, free or discounted special exhibits, and many of these memberships apply to more than one place (for example, zoo membership would apply too all the zoos in the city plus the aquarium).

Dh thinks we wouldn't end up going often enough for it to pay for itself. His proof? We never go! But the reason we never go is because he doesn't want to pay. If we paid the small yearly fee, we could go for free whenever we want and we'd go fairly often. Even if we went once in 2 months (and I think that's a conservative estimate) it would more than pay for itself. But what if I'm wrong? What if we really don't end up taking advantage for whatever reason (or feel forced to take trips to make it worth it)? Also, are there any other issues we should be aware of regarding this type of thing? Have you done this, and has it worked well for your family? Thanks.

Clarissa

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 9:51 am

I think they're absolutely worth it. I belong to between two and four most years, and have never regretted it. Free admission for us (and free or discounted for friends who go along), special access to certain exhibits, plus I help support institutions I really like. I love it. If you go a few times without membership, you basically spend what you paid for the year.

Raisin

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 9:57 am

I think it could be worth it. Usually these memberships are only twice or so one admission. I would do the zoo one year, the next year the childrens museum and so on.

Also when you pay for one day you feel you need to get your moneys worth. This way you can go for just an hour or two once a month.

MiracleMama

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 9:58 am

They are worth it if you use it. And it generally doesn't take more than 2 annual visits to justify the cost. We have done family memberships for botanical gardens, museums, zoo, beaches and parks and with only one exception each has been well worth the cost. Every Sunday we visit one or more of these places. So much nicer than "vegging out" in front of videos.

doctorima

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 10:00 am

We definitely do it and have been happy with our decision. Depending on the ages of the kids, we rotate from year to year where we join. One year was zoos, another was a children's museum, another was a science museum. One financial consideration you didn't mention is that often, much or all of what you pay for membership is tax-deductible, which depending on your tax bracket, can already make the membership almost the same price as just taking the family to the museum once.

Also bear in mind that many museums are part of a larger network - National Association of Science/Children's Museums - and they often have reciprocity, so once you're a member at one, you can get into all of them for free. It doesn't always work at museums close to your home, but most will accept it.

Also, as you mentioned, once you're members, you're likely to go more often, just to use it as a lazy Sunday outing that won't cost anything.

amother

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 10:05 am

Op here. Thanks, that's what I thought. My mother came yesterday and took us to one such place (yeshiva week, everyone home) and it ran us about $50 dollars, and that was bare bones, no special exhibit, imax or other add-ons. Then I looked up membership online and the lowest membership was $85, so two visits to that place would more than pay for it! The next option up was $125 and includes more freebies, so 3 visits does it! Given how dreadful our Sundays are, I have no dount we will meet that bar. I'm going to show dh this thread later. Thanks!

zigi

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 10:06 am

I have the zoo membership, just going to the aquarium is almost the full price of membership for my family.

I do think that brooklyn childrens museum membership is worth it. its close to me and they have a great bathroom, its better than the park nearby. also if you plan on traveling they might give you free admission to other museums like the boston science museum and children's museum is free to members

Fox

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 10:27 am

Nothing to add to what other posters have said -- definitely worth it in my experience. Like Raisin, we alternated memberships from year to year.

With five kids, I found that going to the zoo/museum even twice a year allowed us to break even -- anything beyond that was a bonus. That took care of one day of Chol HaMoed at both Sukkos and Pesach without laying out additional money.

Also, several of the places had free or reduced parking fees for members, so it was great for those times when I literally had about $1.75 in my wallet!

Orchid

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:10 am

Didn't read the responses, but YES!! If you go 2 or 3 times it pays for itself. And whenever we go w/ membership we're almost more relaxed - we don't have to run around to be sure we're getting our last dollar's worth - since we can easily come back any other time. We take our time and spend time in one or two really fun exhibits, and then do another part another time.

ALso you get amazing reciprocity at other museums. We have gone to other cities during chol hamoed travels and gone for free to literally dozens of great museums. Amazing. We love it.

This is the reciprocity list: http://www.astc.org/members/passlist.htm

STovah

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:14 am

We've been members of the NY zoos (WCS) for the last few years, I think there was only one year that our membership went under-used. Brooklyn Children's Museum membership is a great deal since you get admission to other museums + a group of NY area museums lifted the restriction on using reciprocal membership at musuems in the same area, so you can visit the Intrepid, Hall of Science and others with that membership.

zigi

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:19 am

STovah wrote:

wow that is amazing news the intrepid is so expensive and anyways I want to get the bcm membership

momx6

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:37 am

I had the BCM membership. I used almost $600 worth over the year! I also had the zoo membership and I'm over $300 already and it doesn't expire till June.
I love it because if you go and the kids had enough after an hour or two, its ok because we didn't pay to get in.
You just have to be careful because the LICM has a limit on how many kids you can bring in for free.
Btw I have 5 kids that I pay for so its a real savings.
Just for the Bronx zoo it's worth it because you otherwise have to pay for everything separately.

amother

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:43 am

I live in baltimore and hve taken out zoo membership and aquarium membership over the past few years. What I have learned from it is that it is only worthwhile ifyou are definitely going to want to go a couple of times over the ;year,a nd also it is only worth it if there are no other major expenses each time. For example, each time we went to the aquarium we ended up spending a minimum of 15$ for parking, so we just didnt go so often. With the zoo however, parking is free, so no extra expense. On the other hand, my kids are getting older nad do not always wnt to go to the zoo all teh time.

IMHO if you kids are little and will go wherever you take them to mulitiple times and enjoy it, and there are no big parking costs, go for it. have fun.

baltimoremom

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 11:45 am

I dont live in ny, but I agree with everyone else, for most places you only have to go 2 maybe 3 times to the museum or zoo to make it worth it.
I also agree with above posters that the best part of having membership is you can go to that place for an hour or 2 and not feel like you paid so much and that you have to spend more time there. we have gotten membership to our zoo two years in a row and we love it because we can go for an hour and thats fine, plus we can let our kids play on the playground at the zoo and we dont feel like we paid money to go play in a park.
Look into what museums each membership has reciprocity with, they might even have reciprocity with local museums. in the winter our zoo membership gets us into different indoor places for half price or for free which is great.
Additionally, sometimes there are deals where museums will give you 14 months instead of 12.
Lastly, if you put only one adults name on it and leave the other adults name off than you can bring a friend instead of you husband.

little_mage

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 12:13 pm

baltimoremom wrote:

Lastly, if you put only one adults name on it and leave the other adults name off than you can bring a friend instead of you husband.

Actually, this probably depends on the specific policies of the museum in question. We're members of the Art Museum and the Please Touch Museum (Philadelphia Children's) and for both of those, even though my husband's name is also on the card, I've brought in other adults. For the Art Museum, he just can't be with us (it's only a two person) and we can only have one other person at Please Touch, but it's good to have him on it so that he can go with out me.

And I agree that it's worth it. We've been less good about using our Art Museum membership lately, so I'm not sure if it's actually paid for itself (although it doesn't renew until September), but a part of me doesn't entirely mind because it's an institution I want to support.

rise above

Fri, Jan 24 2014, 2:01 pm

Inspired by this thread I looked into ASTC if this would be worth it for my family and I am very confused about the reciprocity guidelines.
It seems to me that I wouldn't be able to go to ANY museum other than the one I signed up for.

I live in Lakewood which is withing 90 miles of all the listings in NJ, NYC and Philly so based on that rule I don't see how I could use this at more than one location.
Can anyone help me with this?
My family loves science museums and children's museums so if I could get a family membership and go to even just Two places it would be worth it for us.

Orchid

Sat, Jan 25 2014, 7:45 pm

rise above wrote:

You cannot take advantage of the reciprocity within 90 miles of your home address, so correct, it would not help if you live in Lakewood and would want to go to NY museums for free using reciprocity.

It helps for people who travel a lot - we live OOT, but travel to the east coast a lot, so we use the reciprocity feature and go to museums for free along our trip (like, say in Pittsburgh) and once we get to our destinations in the east coast itself.

Now I know some people who have gotten membership at odd placed museums such as Cheyenne, Wisconsin, and then used it for museums in their home area. Without commenting on the morality of this, I'm not sure this always works, since some museums will examine your ID to be sure your home address is truly more than 90 miles from the museum you are attempting to get into for free. Others will just look at your museum membership (in this case, from Wisconsin), and say, yup, you can get in for free.