Bochnia Salt Mine: How Droplabs Dynamic Pricing Supports a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Context

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In the 14th century, when the mine became part of the Krakow Saltworks, King Casimir the Great drew on the expertise of Genoese merchants to ensure extraction efficiency and maximize profits from the royal salt monopoly. It was an innovative move by the standards of its time. Today, facing the challenges of modern tourism, the managers of the Mine — a precious UNESCO World Heritage Site — are proving that they are still “not slowing down.” Instead of Italian merchants, the symbol of innovation has become the focus on the online channel for ticket sales in the individual tourist segment and the implementation of Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing system. This modern strategy is designed to boost attendance, streamline tourist-traffic management, and improve the price accessibility of this State Treasury-owned site. The new pricing system opens the Mine to families on tighter budgets by making lower prices available — prices the Mine could not, for economic reasons, offer under a traditional rigid price list.

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Before we move on to the detailed data and results, let's give the floor to the President of the Management Board of the Mine, Mr. Krzysztof Zięba. In a short video interview, he talks about how the Mine increased attendance, how dynamic pricing helped eliminate queues and shift 80% of sales to the online channel, and why an earlier ticket purchase is a benefit both for the tourist and for the site itself.

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The Challenge

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The Bochnia Salt Mine — as a State Treasury company — focuses on finding ways to enable as many people as possible to discover this extraordinary historical and cultural heritage.

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The key operational challenges at the Bochnia Salt Mine stem directly from its status as a historic monument and its unique sightseeing formula:

• Planning challenges and financial risk: Sightseeing takes place only at strictly defined tour start times and must be conducted with a guide. Crucially, the number of places in each group is capped in advance. The challenge is to efficiently create new tours and plan guide staffing. Launching additional groups without sufficient confidence that demand will materialize entails significant logistical and financial risk. At the same time, opening additional groups well in advance has a positive impact on attendance, because it lets a larger number of tourists “fit in” on the most sought-after days.
• Social mission: For the Mine, the priority is the social mission of making UNESCO heritage accessible, so it's important that tickets remain affordable. At the same time, rising operating costs — guide and staff salaries, maintenance of the historic site, and the desire to continually improve the visitor experience — require a steady generation of financial resources.

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To respond effectively to these complex challenges, in the first quarter of 2025 the managers of the Bochnia Salt Mine made a strategic decision. They bet on the full dominance of the online channel in ticket sales in the individual tourist segment and implemented the Droplabs Dynamic Pricing system. The choice fell on a partner that had already successfully helped solve the operational challenges of such prestigious sites as, among others, Tatra National Park (TPN).

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The Solution

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Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing strategy works based on proprietary algorithms that raise prices for selected dates in real time. These algorithms analyze comprehensive data, such as weather forecasts, current signals from the online store, and historical trends, in order to achieve the optimal price. The goal is twofold: to maintain strong interest in the offer and, at the same time, to encourage customers to buy earlier.

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Before Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing was introduced, the Mine's sightseeing prices were the same in the online channel as at the box office. For example, in the low season a guided visit to the “Tourist Route with the Underground Multimedia Exhibition” for a 2+1 family:

• before Dynamic Pricing was introduced cost PLN 178
• after Dynamic Pricing was introduced cost: PLN 166 online; PLN 196 at the box office.

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Dynamic prices immediately broadened access to the Mine: a 2+1 family could now buy a ticket online from PLN 166, which meant savings of PLN 12 compared with the earlier rigid price list. In this way the Mine strategically combined care for its social mission of cultural accessibility with financial efficiency, while also increasing revenue — the details of this balance are discussed in the following paragraphs.

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The message “Buy earlier, pay less!” was visible to visitors right on the Mine's homepage. This direct communication effectively directed customers to the online store, where they could immediately see the full range of prices varying depending on the date of their visit.

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The result?

Two out of three tourists have their ticket purchased at least a day before the visit! The effectiveness of the decisions made in marketing, visitor management, and pricing policy was reflected in tourists' ratings. The average Google rating during the first six months of Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing reached an impressive 4.9/5! This is a significant increase compared to 4.6/5 in the same period the previous year, clearly confirming the excellent work done by the Mine's staff, management, and board in carrying out the site's mission.

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Aggregate results from six months of Droplabs Dynamic Pricing

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March 2025 – August 2025

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Attendance

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• The Mine recorded a spectacular increase in individual attendance of 31% year-on-year, rising from 39,000 to 51,000 visitors over six months. Several key factors contributed to this success:

• Effective marketing: Successful promotional activities carried out by the Mine's in-house team.
• Efficient addition of new tours: The Mine's team proactively responded to early sell-out signals, of which there were more than in the previous year thanks to a larger number of tourists buying in advance. Thanks to efficient advance work, additional guides were arranged and new sightseeing tours were launched, which made it possible to serve additional visitors compared with the previous year.
• Market conditions in the Mine's context: the impact of external factors such as weather, interest in the offer, and the competitive situation.
• Lower susceptibility to changes of plans: The Dynamic Pricing system contributed to an increased number of tourists buying tickets in advance and, as a result, less frequently changing their plans. The estimated additional attendance from this over six months is +2.8 thousand people. That represents a 7% increase over the attendance that would have been achieved under market conditions with a traditional sales model.
• Better price affordability was achieved — through broad availability of sightseeing tours at lower prices than would be available under a traditional sales strategy.
• 66% of guests had tickets purchased at least 1 day in advance.
• 25% of guests had tickets purchased at least 4 days in advance.

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Additional revenue

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• At the same time, it was possible to earn more from price-insensitive customers — the revenue surplus above minimum prices from the online channel alone amounted to several hundred thousand PLN over six months.
• Slightly less than one percent of money paid online is money for tickets that are ultimately not used, where the customer has not processed a refund or a date change — so-called “no-shows.” Over six months at the Bochnia Salt Mine, that is tens of thousands of PLN of additional revenue! And it's worth noting that the Mine is very tourist-friendly and does process date changes and refunds!
• Taking into account the excellent attendance result and higher average revenue per visitor, year on year the Mine generated a total revenue that was 45% higher from individual customers than in the same period the year before.

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Speed of service and operational optimizations

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• Dominance of the online channel: As many as 80% of individual tourists bought their ticket online and went directly to the elevator shaft, where the ticket was scanned by the guide, bypassing the box office. Sales at the ticket office accounted for only 20% of the total.
• Zero queues and less stress: Thanks to the high share of tourists buying in advance (almost all guests bought online), no queues formed and there was no nervous atmosphere, even on the busiest days (close to a thousand tourists per day) and within the limited space of the hall.
• Better attendance forecasting: Information about advance sales and notifications from the Droplabs panel enabled the team to forecast attendance much more accurately.
• More efficient tour management: Better predictability made it possible to add additional tours more efficiently, maximizing the site's capacity while minimizing the economic risk associated with launching under-filled groups.

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Marketing driving future attendance

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• Average rating in Google for this period: 4.9/5 versus 4.6/5 the previous year.
• Number of Google reviews added during this period: 1,554 versus 227 in the previous period (almost a 7-fold increase!)

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Case in point: Tourist Route with the Underground Boat Crossing

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To illustrate how Droplabs' dynamic pricing works, let's look at how the price of a standard ticket for the popular Tourist Route with the Underground Boat Crossing evolved ahead of the May long weekend.

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In mid-April, a ticket for May 1 could be purchased for PLN 103. Initially, three sightseeing tours were available (one guided group per tour). Customers had a clear incentive to buy earlier.

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The Droplabs system, monitoring the speed at which routes were filling up, sent signals to the Mine's team. Thanks to this information and the team's intensive work, the Mine was able to respond quickly:

• New tours (time slots) were added.
• Capacity was increased for existing time slots by arranging additional guides and launching additional tours.

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The effect on price and capacity:

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• Mid-April – cheapest ticket price for May 1: PLN 103, 3 tours, 3 groups
• April 27 – cheapest ticket price for May 1: PLN 111, 5 tours, 10 groups
• April 29 – cheapest ticket price for May 1: PLN 114, 6 tours, 12 groups

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As a result, despite an increase in ticket price of PLN 11 (from PLN 103 to PLN 114), the Mine increased its capacity to serve visitors fourfold (from 3 to 12 groups), maximizing both revenue and attendance.

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It's worth emphasizing that all these dynamic changes in prices and capacity took place just two days before the tourists' visit. There was still room to add more time slots, yet as many as 11 of the 12 groups were already nearly full for that day.

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The Dynamic Pricing policy effectively motivated customers to make purchases significantly earlier. The comparison with the previous year (before Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing was implemented) is striking:

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• End of April 27, 2024 – number of places sold for May 1–4: 601 places
• End of April 27, 2025 (after Dynamic Pricing implementation) – number of places sold for May 1–4: 916 places – an increase of +52%

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Thanks to this strategy, the number of prepaid places for the key long weekend grew by more than 50% year on year. This means significantly greater planning certainty and a more stable revenue stream for the Mine.

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A success for price accessibility

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In the face of inflation and a declining-birthrate trend, family attractions face a key dilemma: how to keep the offer accessible for customers with limited budgets while also securing the revenue necessary to develop and maintain high-quality services? The Bochnia Salt Mine has effectively solved this problem.

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In the high season (from May to the end of October) 2025, the price of a 2+1 Family ticket for the extended Tourist Route with the Boat Crossing was:

• Online: from PLN 254
• At the box office: PLN 284

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In practice, as many as 36% of all 2+1 family tickets for this extended route, purchased online, were sold at a price below PLN 265! This means that the dynamic pricing system gave a significant group of families access to the sightseeing offer at a more affordable price, fulfilling the mission of expanding accessibility — without sacrificing revenue, since overall it significantly increased it.

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Let's look at the price list for a 2+1 family on Sunday, October 12. Dynamic Pricing translates into real flexibility:

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The family can save PLN 17 by choosing the 2:00 p.m. tour (price: PLN 254), or consciously opt for an earlier time (before 1:00 p.m.) and accept a higher fee. The Mine thus gives visitors the ability to manage their own budget by choosing the date that is optimal for them.

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Both the Mine's excellent results and guests' Google reviews show that tourists respond positively to the opportunity to buy at lower prices and to dynamic pricing.

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The ticket as an anchor: how Dynamic Pricing stabilizes attendance

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Selling tickets in advance is about more than just better cash flow; it's also a safeguard against the capricious nature of human decision-making. Money spent in advance creates a strong commitment that protects the tourist's plan from a spontaneous change of mind.

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The evidence from the Bochnia Salt Mine is telling: despite being able to change plans, only 5% of tourists who bought a ticket online at least one day in advance ultimately changed their plans:

• only 2.7% decided on a refund,
• 1.7% changed the date,
• and about 1% is the group for whom neither a refund nor a date change was processed — the tourist simply didn't show up despite having paid (so-called “no-shows”).

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Securing the marketing investment

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If even people who have already incurred the cost and formally booked their time can back out, how fragile are the plans of those who only thought about visiting but didn't buy a ticket? For them, the smallest nudge is enough — a change in weather, another suggestion for how to spend the weekend, or plain laziness — and the entire costly marketing effort goes to waste.

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The ticket acts as a psychological anchor. When the customer has already taken action (bought the ticket) and knows they would need to spend time getting in touch to request a refund, their plan becomes “locked in.” As humans, we are far less susceptible to distraction when the plan is already paid for.

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That's why it's essential that, under the “anchoring” hypothesis mentioned above, the implementation of Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing significantly increased the share of tourists paying in advance. This larger pool of customers with an “anchored” plan translated into stable attendance. The estimated attendance increase from this purchasing mobilization is +2.8 thousand additional tourists over six months, which represents a 7% increase over the attendance attainable under a traditional sales model. Dynamic Pricing not only lifts profits — above all, it secures attendance against shifts in customer sentiment.

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Revenue growth despite greater accessibility

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The dynamic pricing strategy made it possible to effectively tap into the potential of less price-sensitive customers who, given the choice, consciously picked tours at higher prices. The revenue surplus generated through the online channel, above set minimum prices, amounted to several hundred thousand PLN over six months.

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In addition, thanks to the online sales mechanism, the Mine earned additional revenue in the order of tens of thousands of PLN from unused tickets (so-called “no-shows”). Although the Mine remains very tourist-friendly, offering flexible refunds and date changes, just under one percent of funds paid online remains with the Mine when guests neither show up nor request a refund/change.

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Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing is the key to balancing the Mine's goals. The system makes it possible to offer lower prices to cost-sensitive customers while providing the Mine with satisfactory revenue. Thanks to this, the attraction can grow and continue delivering unforgettable experiences to its visitors.

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Service transformation and comfort for tourists and employees

Focusing on the online channel translated into a radical change in visitor service and logistics. As many as 80% of individual tourists bought their ticket online and went directly to the elevator shaft, where their passes were scanned by the guide, entirely bypassing the traditional ticket-office counters. Thanks to this mass shift to the digital channel, the Mine achieved an important goal: no queues at the ticket office and significantly less stress for employees and tourists. Even on days of record attendance (close to a thousand tourists per day) and in the constrained space of the hall, the high share of guests buying in advance meant that no nervous atmosphere or bottlenecks formed before going underground.

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A significant reduction of box-office sales to just 20% of the total means that staff resources (and cashiers' time) can be allocated to other key tasks directly related to visitor service and to planning additional tours.

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Marketing and brand uplift: fuel for future attendance

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A key driver of future attendance is the brand's online image. Over the period analyzed, the average Google rating rose from 4.6/5 to an impressive 4.9/5 (comparison of analogous periods year over year). This achievement is primarily the credit of the Mine's management and team, who delivered a higher quality of service and sightseeing while simultaneously managing pricing effectively.

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High ratings are also the best confirmation that the entire Droplabs Dynamic Pricing system is effective and fair — otherwise dissatisfaction would have been immediately reflected in reviews. At the same time, the Mine recorded an almost sevenfold increase in the number of new reviews (1,554 reviews added versus 227 the previous year). This surge was directly aided by the Droplabs system, which automatically encourages customers to leave a review after their visit.

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A flood of fresh, positive reviews is the strongest “social proof,” which instantly builds trust and motivates further potential tourists to book.

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Conclusions: balance between mission and profitability

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The implementation of Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing in the first quarter of 2025 turned out to be an important element helping the managers of the Bochnia Salt Mine strike a balance between the social mission of making UNESCO Heritage accessible and the need to generate resources for the development and maintenance of the monument.

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1. Confirmation of the fairness of the strategy: The increase in the average Google rating from 4.6/5 to 4.9/5 is the strongest evidence that the Dynamic Pricing system is effective and fair for Polish families. The Mine's team delivers higher-quality service, and higher peak prices did not reduce satisfaction or accessibility, which is crucial for managing a public site.
2. Maximizing accessibility and attendance: The new pricing system opened the Mine to families with smaller budgets, offering lower prices outside peak times while also motivating earlier purchases.
3. Operational and financial optimization: Thanks to early demand signals, the Mine could proactively create new sightseeing tours and optimize resource allocation. Despite greater price accessibility, total revenue grew by 45% year on year, made possible by effectively tapping into the potential of less price-sensitive customers and by increasing overall attendance.
4. Service improvement: The dominance of the online channel (80% of sales) eliminated queues at the ticket office, which increased comfort for guests and employees and allowed management to redirect staff resources from the ticket office to key service-related tasks.

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The Bochnia Salt Mine has shown that Droplabs' Dynamic Pricing is not an untested novelty in the heritage sector. It is a proven and effective management tool that can be successfully applied by other public cultural sites and tourist attractions, enabling them to simultaneously fulfill their cultural and social mission and generate the revenue essential for the development and maintenance of such important Polish monuments.