For Museums & Galleries
One press team. Every venue. Every exhibition.
Press Pilot is the newsroom for cultural institutions with multiple sites, partner venues and overlapping exhibition calendars - and a critic list that needs more care than a spreadsheet.
The cultural shape
A flagship, two satellites, a touring show and a residency - opening the same fortnight.
Cultural press lives or dies on lead times and relationships. Press Pilot holds the calendar, the embargoes and the critic list together so curators and comms aren't rebuilding the press plan from scratch each season.
Exhibition launch playbooks
Pre-built pitch sequences for openings, residencies, acquisitions and touring shows. Lead times respected.
Partner-venue intake
Co-presented programmes, satellite venues and partner curators all submit through one portal.
Arts & culture press, well-tended
Critics, listings editors and cultural-trade journalists - kept current, segmented by patch and discipline.
Embargo & preview management
Tiered previews for press, members and trustees. No leaks. No accidental sends.
Funder & trustee reporting
Coverage tied to specific funded projects. Trustee packs that don't take a week to compile.
Image & asset library
Press images, credits and rights notes attached to every story. The picture desk gets what it needs, first time.
A typical opening
From announcement to preview to opening night.
- −12 wkLong-lead pitches to monthly arts press. Images, credits and curator quotes already attached.
- −6 wkTrade and listings press briefed. Preview invite tiers set against critic relationships.
- −2 wkEmbargoed exclusives placed. Coverage windows tracked against the opening date.
- OpenReviews land in a single dashboard. Funders, trustees and partner venues all see their cut by Monday.
The cultural reality
A critic's diary fills six months out. The press team is still on this week's PDF.
Cultural comms runs on two clocks at once. Long-lead arts press is locking pages for next quarter while the listings team needs copy for next Friday. Critics expect tiered previews, curators want their checklists honoured, image desks need credits and rights perfectly attached, and the funder report is due the same week as the opening. Most teams hold this together on heroics and goodwill.
Press Pilot is the system underneath the season. Exhibitions, residencies, acquisitions and touring shows each get a pre-built playbook with the right lead times baked in. Partner venues and co-presenters submit through one intake. Embargoes and preview tiers are managed, not whispered. Coverage maps back to the funded projects the trustees and grant-makers care about. The picture desk gets what it needs, first time, every time.
"The day after opening, the trustee report was already written. We've never had that before."
A day in the life
A Tuesday with Eleanor, Press Manager at a museum group with three venues.
Eleanor handles press across a flagship museum, a contemporary gallery and a heritage site, plus two touring exhibitions a year. Tuesdays are a mix of long-lead and live coverage.
08.30
Long-lead pitching window. Press Pilot has surfaced three monthly arts titles whose next deadlines fall this fortnight. Eleanor reviews the matched exhibitions, approves two pitches with curator quotes and high-res images already attached.
09.45
Critic-list grooming. A senior reviewer at a broadsheet has changed beats - Press Pilot flagged it from a byline pattern. Eleanor reassigns the next preview invite to the incoming critic, with a short personal note.
11.00
Partner-venue intake. A co-presented touring show submits its launch pack from the partner side of the portal. Embargo, image rights and credit line all attached. Eleanor schedules a tiered preview - trustees, press, members - without a single spreadsheet.
12.30
Lunchtime walk through the gallery with the curator. They voice-note three new angles for the residency programme. By the time she's back at her desk, three drafts are waiting.
14.00
Live coverage from last week's opening is still landing. Eleanor tags each review against the trust-funded project that paid for the show. The trustee pack updates itself.
15.15
Funder report due Friday. Eleanor exports the cut: coverage, audience numbers, image impressions, partner co-credits. Adds two paragraphs of curatorial context. Done before 4.
16.30
Picture desk at a national paper emails for an image. Eleanor pulls it from the asset library inside the platform with the right credit and rights line already on file. Replies in under three minutes.
One newsroom for every venue, every season.
A 30-minute demo, tailored to your organisation. No slideware. We'll use your real partner list and show you what week one would actually look like.
Book a demoOr read the 30-day plan before you commit.