‘A remarkable turnaround’: The local museum shop that beat nationals on a shoestring

When The D-Day Story won Shop of the Year at the Museums + Heritage Awards in May 2025, retail manager Ellen Tovell and Head of Museums at Portsmouth City Council Cathy Hakes could hardly believe it.

Competing against The National Gallery, National Football Museum, Dundee Contemporary Arts, and The Real Mary King’s Close, their small council-run team had achieved what judges called “a remarkable turnaround on a shoestring budget and in record time.”

As the pair describe it, The D-Day Story’s shop was stocked with quality products at fair prices, but customers were leaving them on shelves. The team’s award recognised a game-changing breakthrough that finally got visitors buying, and under tight deadlines.

Eight months on, Hakes and Tovell reflect on how they rapidly transformed their shop into an award-winner, why retail efforts deserve recognition, and their advice for small teams doubting they can compete.

Racing Against D-Day 80

The D-Day Story’s shop refit happened under intense pressure. It had reopened in 2018 after receiving NHLF funding which had transformed the galleries and displays, but by 2024, with the 80th anniversary of D-Day approaching, the shop’s sales weren’t living up to the quality of the products.

“The time scale that we turned around the refit was beyond challenging, but we did it. Not many teams, even bigger teams might have been able to do that,” Hakes explains.

“We knew that we wanted to improve the shop because Ellen creates amazing products as a fantastic buyer, but the shop was just letting down the products. It was dark. It didn’t have enough light in it. The shelves were unsuitable. The layout was wrong. There’s nothing really positive you could say about it.

“You could put something really good in there and it would just sort of disappear.”

With royalty visiting Portsmouth for the 80th anniversary on June 6, 2024 and the city hosting major commemorative events, the stakes were high.

“We wanted everything to be the best standard it could,” Hakes continues.

“If we missed that opportunity; all those people coming to Portsmouth ready to support the museum by buying products and we wouldn’t have been ready.”

“Ellen had already been planning products from much earlier in the year, but we didn’t know we were going to have the shop refit until a lot later, so it was quite an intense project to get it done on time.”

Great products still need a great story

Asked about the signs that their shop wasn’t performing because of its space, rather than its products, Hakes said it came down to experience.

“It’s just learning by experience what works and what doesn’t, and it really is fundamentally that simple sometimes.”

Lighting was a major issue: “If people can’t see products, or the shelves are too dark and you can’t see the product, things just get swallowed up in this darkness,” Hakes explains.

“Another major thing is the way people move around the shop. Just changing that automatically changes the dynamic, as does categorising things so they’re easy to find. The specialist support we had from Studio Moo who worked up the designs on this project was invaluable.”

“You need to make it easy for people who are having a day out,” Hakes emphasises. “They don’t want to be racking their brains about where to find something. You have to make it easy for them.”

Tovell recognised the problem immediately. “We didn’t have a load of old rubbish in the shop before, but it just didn’t sit right. You know, when things don’t sit on the shelves properly and you can’t really see them, you think, ‘well, what’s wrong with this product? It’s a good product, it’s not an outrageous price, why isn’t it selling?’, and it’s because the customer flow just wasn’t helping. Retail is not just one thing, it’s quite a lot of things all together”.

 

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Finding the Unique Story

Tovell’s approach to product development starts with an important practice, walking the museum as a visitor would.

“I just went around the museum again as a visitor and saw what we had. And I thought about what is unique to us. There are a lot of military museums with connections to battles and things like that. Everybody’s got Spitfires. But the Spitfires for D-Day have got invasion stripes on them.”

That observation led to an entire product line unique to The D-Day Story. “Hence a line of products with invasion stripes on that are totally unique to us,” Tovell explains.

Balancing commemorative products with broader appeal also required care. “People like products with a little bit of a sense of humour to them. That is a very difficult thing to do with a military museum because you’ve got a legacy and you’ve got people invested in what their relatives did before.”

Getting the tone of humour right was something they had done before. Gustav the D-Day Pigeon, which had already won best product at the Association of Cultural Enterprise in 2019, got an expansion.

“I got some socks made with pigeons on and some lollies with pigeons on. It’s a good way in, particularly for children. The main thing I wanted to avoid is that everything is green and pink camo.”

The D-Day Story’s 83 metre Overlord Embroidery, larger than Bayeux Tapestry, was bringing in new audiences. “So that means that I could do a lot of sewing kits and embroidery and things like that, to reflect the wider audience that we were getting in as well.”

A dedicated LCT (Landing Craft Tank) product range with its own brand now generates income for the conservation sinking fund. “After the refit, we suddenly have money in there. So that was really, really good result,” Hakes reports.

 

Even Bertie, a ventriloquist dummy taken to D-Day by Captain Ted North, became part of the shop’s strategy.

“That’s an incredible object, but not what you’d expect. So we used him a lot. We used him in a massive sign at the front of the shop as a welcome and a call for action.”

“I think we found overwhelmingly that people really want to support their museums, and retail is just such a good way to do that. Just make it easy for them and give them what they want.”

The results of the refit speak for themselves. Best sellers have now completely shifted, with a local brewery beer, supporting the LCT fund, now in the top ten, having been repositioned.

Hakes said the decision to enter the awards came after the team saw shop figures climb. “I realised that we cracked it and I thought, wow, it’s extraordinary that this has happened.”

Transformative Recognition

“To come back being the only area in the team that’s won a Museum + Heritage Award in this museum service was quite something,” Hakes said.

“The international recognition, the local recognition, the recognition from our local authority…they know how important it is and what a big deal it is. So I think it’s transformative.”

The team has since won another local award, the Beautiful South Awards. “It just encourages the rest of the team to think, you know what? Yes we can. We’re doing great things. And I don’t think anyone would have expected us to win that award. So that was a nice surprise factor as well.”

“It is transformational because it does affect how people view what you’re doing. And that opens a lot of doors.”

Rolling out success to more shops

Now, with the shop’s refit on an upward trajectory, future plans include a full review of the shop’s success, growing online retail with an online shop, and rolling out success across Portsmouth Museums’ five other shops.

The next big project will be the Portsmouth Natural History Museum, where plans are beginning to offer eco-friendly and locally sourced products.

Tovell is also working on Portsmouth 100 products for the city’s centenary plans are only limited by the size of the team. “It’s all about capacity really,” Hakes notes.

For Tovell, the judges’ comments proved especially valuable. “What really helped me personally was reading the judges’ comments. That was just so encouraging. When you’re working in a little bubble by yourself, you just don’t think of that. You’re just trying to think of the end, what that product will look like, or is it going to sell.”

“The competition was so good”

“It took a long time to come back down to earth,” Tovell recalls of the win at the Museums + Heritage Awards in 2025.

“The competition was so good, there were some really tight shops; the National Gallery. Wow.”

For Hakes, the win carried strategic significance beyond the immediate celebration.

“I think, strategically, for us to win something like that really puts the service on the map. This level of award gives the work credibility” Hakes explains.

“I just knew that it would make a lot of difference to our credibility and the way people saw us. It showed that we’re really serious about what we’re doing and we can be the best in whatever area, we can be the best at what we’re doing.”

The win also elevated retail within the museum itself. “Sometimes retail isn’t looked at as other things in the museum,”Hakes notes, “and to come away with an award as prestigious as this, it really is the best award we could have won.”

Hakes advice to others hoping to win recognition is clear. “I think it’s just about having belief”.

“I’m sure there’s lots and lots of projects going on across the country, and maybe people just don’t feel that their project is up there, but I think they should give it a go. Sometimes people find it hard to sell what they’re doing.”

“I come across people all the time, they’re doing brilliant, amazing things and sometimes they just need a bit of a nudge.

“Even just the process of filling in the application form, although it’s another thing to do, and you’re tired and you’ve had a long week, it’s really worth it for people putting themselves forward.”