Museum seeks visibility after major rebranding

The museum officials sat behind a one-way glass window and listened in as people in focus groups gave honest feedback about their organization.

A researcher posed questions to people from Sarasota, Manatee and Tampa and people likely to visit museums. The results of the two focus group sessions bolstered the need for what the museum had already started pursuing — a new identity. “That’s when we learned we were invisible,” says Brynne Anne Besio, CEO of the Bradenton institution formerly known as the South Florida Museum, now The Bishop Museum of Science and Nature.