MUSEUMS INCREASINGLY RELYING ON CORPORATE SPONSORS

Europe’s flagship museums—the Uffizi, the Louvre, the British Museum—are feeling financially strapped. Thrifty governments facing European Union deficit limits are capping cultural handouts and compelling museums to make money on the side by seeking sponsors, hiring out halls and selling snacks and knickknacks, Bloomberg reports. As a result, even as museums draw record crowds, they increasingly rely on sponsors. To put on shows, fund new wings and restore crumbling galleries, museums get help from the likes of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA, the world’s largest luxury-goods company; and BP Plc and Total SA, Europe’s largest and third-largest oil companies; as well as national lotteries.