The Louisiana Music & Heritage Experience, a long-planned museum intended to tell the story of the state’s musical genres, has finalized a deal with global food and beverage company Sodexo LIVE! to help fund and operate the attraction, originally envisioned as a “cultural anchor” for the River District.
Under the terms of the deal, Sodexo has been awarded a contract to provide food and beverage services at the New Orleans museum, including catering the banquets, parties and private events that are expected to generate nearly half the facility’s revenues.
In return, the company has agreed to front money to the project’s nonprofit backers for planning and design. Sodexo declined to disclose the amount of its investment, but a source familiar with the deal, who asked for anonymity to share details of the private transaction, said that Sodexo was putting several million dollars toward the museum. While substantial, the figure is far short of the estimated $170 million cost.
The funding commitment from Sodexo is one of several. Others include $28.5 million in construction funding from the legislature and $16.5 million in pledges towards a goal of $65 million. The museum is also hoping to raise $80 million from a bond issuance.
The deal is nevertheless a significant development for the museum, according to Chris Beary, who is leading the project’s efforts. It comes as plans to locate the attraction in the heart of the River District near the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center are back on the table after falling apart last year.
Chris Beary, shown in this 2022 file photo from his reign as King of Tucks.
“We knew we needed to bring in an international operator to work the food and beverage side of this,” Beary said. “Sodexo coming online now means they will be involved in things like the kitchen design, supply chain design.”
Beary said the funding will come in tranches, once certain milestones — like finalizing a lease for a location — are met.
In a statement, Sodexo CEO Belinda Oakley said, “Working with cultural institutions around the world has taught us that hospitality is about honoring the story being told. LMHE’s mission to preserve the artists and communities who shaped American music is work we want to be part of.”
The museum deal is the latest of several local contracts for Sodexo, which counts the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, National WWII Museum, Tulane University and, until recently, the Caesars Superdome and Smoothie King Center among its 500 clients worldwide.
Two options
The Louisiana Music & Heritage Experience has been described by backers as a New Orleans-based answer to the Cleveland Rock & Roll Hall of Fame that would tell the story of the state’s rich musical heritage, including jazz, blues, gospel, Cajun, zydeco, swamp pop, funk and hip-hop.
The museum has also assumed a special significance as a cultural anchor for the River District, the planned mixed-use neighborhood next to the Convention Center.
A rendering of the lobby of the proposed Louisiana Music and Heritage Experience museum.
But the project stalled last year, when talks between the Convention Center and the group developing the neighborhood, Louis Lauricella’s River District Neighborhood Initiative, or RDNI, fell apart after RDNI missed key performance and payment deadlines.
Earlier this month, RDNI agreed to a revised deal that shrinks RDNI’s footprint and returns control of several parcels in the neighborhood to the Convention Center. The deal also calls for the board to restart talks with Beary’s group in hopes of getting the museum to the neighborhood.
The latest site plan for the River District, a multi-billion-dollar project that aims to build an entire entertainment-focused neighborhood on riverside urban land owned by the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center.
While those talks are underway, the museum’s board has been scouting for other potential locations and currently is negotiating with the owners of a parking lot on the edge of the French Quarter at the intersection of Basin and St. Louis streets. A potential site on Rampart Street is no longer an option.
The Sodexo contract, he said, is not tied to either of the two locations currently on the table.
“We are negotiating with both sites,” Beary said. “We are very hopeful that within two to three weeks, we will have terms from both we can compare and evaluate so we can move forward.”
The Convention Center declined to comment.
‘Integrated experience’
Beary said that having an established food and beverage provider is essential to the museum’s business plan.
The Louisiana Music and Heritage Experience was originally planned for a parcel across from the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center on state-owned land in the River District.
“What makes these institutions work is a combination of revenue sources from tickets and events — private parties, lunches, dinner and a show,” he said.
Beary said the plan is to offer a series of programs to corporate clients, private groups and other organizations who will rent a part or all of the museum for events and meals that will be “integrated into the experience of the museum itself.”
“That kind of programming calls for a robust food and beverage operator,” said Beary, who estimates private parties and event rentals will account for between 40% and 50% of the museum’s total revenues.
Sodexo’s proposal for the museum was selected from among half a dozen or so others from national companies that responded to a solicitation from the museum, Beary said.
Local restaurant groups were given an opportunity to bid on the project, he said, but none responded.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.nola.com ’
