Priced like
a piece of software,
not a capital project.
Studio is self-serve at a published price. Institution is quoted to your institution’s size — one call, a number in writing, no procurement theater. No per-visitor metering on any plan.
We build your first tour with you — most are live to visitors within the first week. The pilot runs the full Institution feature set, so you decide with the real thing in hand. At day thirty, pick the plan that fits. If none does, you keep your scripts and your audio.
Side by side, no asterisks.
What would the program actually cost?
Convo against full-service vendor production — the like-for-like on quality and languages. Drag the sliders to a typical year of your program. Flat subscription on our side — exhibitions, stops, and languages don't change the number.
HOW WE GOT THESE NUMBERS
Outsourced production, not in-house. The comparison is against what a director would pay an outside studio-and-services vendor — script, voice talent, recording, edit, master. An in-house production is cheaper in cash but not in time; we don't try to model that.
$750 per stop (English-only production). Midpoint of the $400–$1,500 per-stop range reconstructed from state and municipal museum RFP awards, vendor service descriptions, and the practitioner literature (Museums and the Web, AAM). Covers scripting, voice talent, studio time, edit, and project management.
65% per added language. Each additional language costs roughly 50–80% of the English production cost — script is done, but translation, voicing, and editing still apply per language. Translation rates per Slator's May 2024 market report ($0.12–$0.30/word for specialized content) and the ATA Compensation Survey (6th ed.). Cultural translation lands at the upper end of that band.
6 months for the first tour; +1.25 months per added language. Median English-only first-tour production runs 4–9 months kickoff to live; each additional language adds calendar time even when staffed in parallel. Reconstructed from awarded state-museum RFP timelines and Museums and the Web case studies. The time figure is for a single first launch — additional exhibitions queue behind it.
The five-year line. The exhibitions slider is per year, so the legacy 5-year total is five production cycles. We add nothing for mid-cycle corrections or refreshes — even though legacy vendor session minimums run $1,500–$3,500 per single-stop correction — so the legacy column is, if anything, understated.
What about doing it yourselves? A DIY tour — staff writing, a staff voice, a USB mic — can run $500–$2,500 in cash if you treat your own hours as free, and a hybrid (freelance script and voice, in-house everything else) lands around $6,000–$14,000. Both are single-language; we don't model them because the cash number hides weeks of staff time, and the comparison collapses the moment you add a second language. If a single-language, staff-voiced tour genuinely meets your needs, do that — it's cheaper than us. The column above is the full-service production a director would otherwise commission.
Convo pricing. Published on the pricing page — Studio at $600/month is what the calculator uses, because it's the price we publish. Institution is quoted to the institution's size. Every plan includes unlimited edits and up to ten active languages; exhibition count doesn't change the subscription.
For the full methodology and 5-year scenarios, see the TCO breakdown and the buying and cost guide.
From kickoff to QR code, in two weeks.
Thirty minutes. We agree on one gallery to start with and the sources you’ll send.
Catalog, wall text, curator notes — anything. We turn it into a working tour script.
You read the scripts. Two refinement rounds. Voice tuned to the room.
Audio generated in every language you’ve activated. QR codes designed and printed.
QR poster goes up. You see your first visitor questions roll in by the end of the week.