2023-12-11 17:27:26
Foreign tourists coming for the Olympics have an interest in saving money. Not only will the prices of nights in Ile-de-France hotels explode from €169 on average in July 2023 to €699, the metro ticket will almost double to €4, but some major museums are also increasing their prices.
The entrance ticket to the Louvre will thus increase from €17 to €22 from January 15, 2024. The management justifies this jump by the surge in its energy expenses (+ 88%) while its prices have not “not seen an increase for eight years”. The increase in the entrance ticket of 29% would therefore correspond to inflation during this period (30%). In reality, by strongly advising its visitors since the summer of 2019 to no longer buy their ticket on site (at €15) but to reserve (at €17) to be sure of being able to enter, the Louvre had already carried out a “disguised increase” as pointed out in The cross Jean-Michel Tobelem, professor of cultural management sciences at Paris-1 University.
60% of French visitors enter the Louvre for free
The Louvre is all the more seeking to increase its ticketing revenue as, since 2022, the setting of a maximum number of 30,000 visitors per day, intended to improve comfort in the rooms, has curbed its attendance. Thus in 2023, despite the return of tourists to the capital, the museum should have welcomed 8.7 million visitors, far from its 2018 record (10.11 million).
Finally, the museum claims that 40% of its visitors benefit from free admission and even 60% of its French visitors. These include people under 18, young people aged 18 to 25 from the European Union, job seekers, beneficiaries of minimum social benefits and the public of the free evening on the first Friday of the month (at instead of the 1st Sunday of the month free, removed in 2013).
Versailles follows, Orsay resists
The public establishment of Versailles also announces an increase, due to inflation in its operating costs. The entrance ticket for the castle alone will increase in 2024 from €19.50 to €21, after increasing by €1.50 in August 2022, or +16.6% in a year and a half. The “passport” for the entire area goes from €21.50 to €24, after increasing by €1.50 in August 2022, or +20%. Its expected attendance for 2023, estimated at 8 million visitors in 2023, has however returned almost to the record level of 2019 (8.2 million).
For its part, the Musée d’Orsay is resisting the temptation to increase its prices. The last increase in its price list dates back to September 2018. The ticket for the collections then increased from €12 to €14 on site, €16 online. Entrance tickets to the Orangerie were increased in May 2020 from €9 to €11. The president of the Orsay and Orangerie Museums, Christophe Leribault, wishes to maintain this status quo so as not to penalize the most modest visitors and attract more young people. He has established nightly evenings for them at €10 every Thursday, in addition to free admission on the first Sundays of the month.
Pricing policy remains, in fact, one of the levers of cultural democratization. According to the Patrimostat 2020 survey of the Ministry of Culture, “four out of ten French people had given up on a cultural visit in 2019 due to a price considered too high». In 82% of these cases of renunciation, the full price exceeded €10.
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