Central Stories general manager Maurice Watson and chairman Malcolm Macpherson gave a presentation at last week's Central Otago District Council meeting on the museum's financial performance for the year to June 2017.
The museum has only two full-time-equivalent staff and is open 364 days of the year, Christmas Day being the only day it is closed.
There was a $3782 deficit in the 2015-16 financial year and a $26,029 surplus in 2016-17.
Mr Watson said the change in finances was because of the opening of The Good Art Shop in mid-2016, which added a revenue stream, and better signs, which increased the building's visibility.
Last year, a sign outside the building was changed from ''Central Stories'' to ''Gallery & Museum'', making the facility's purpose clear.
Flags advertising the museum were also installed 600m on the south side of the Alexandra bridge.
Central Stories also wanted to have its name added to the brown NZTA tourism signs around the town and hoped to have this done by mid-2018.
Mr Watson told the Otago Daily Times the highlights of the 2016-17 year for him were the Euan Macleod exhibition in mid-2016 and the Nigel Brown exhibition in mid-2017.
Macleod is a New Zealand painter based in Australia - his exhibition in Alexandra was the biggest in the Central Otago-Queenstown Lakes region.
Brown is a renowned Dunedin-based artist.
Mr Watson also said the launch of poet Michael Harlow's book Nothing For It But To Sing in October 2016 was popular.
There was also a significant increase in school groups visiting, 882 pupils visiting in the 2016-17 year, compared with 268 the previous year.
Mr Watson started working at Central Stories in October 2015.
For the 2017-18 financial year, the gallery was looking forward to the Elizabeth Stevens exhibition, which would run from Sunday to April 29.
The exhibition would be the late Central Otago artist's biggest.
At the council meeting, Central Otago Mayor Tim Cadogan said the 2016-17 financial result was ''outstanding''.
But councillor Malcolm Topliss said running an operation like Central Stories with only two full-time-equivalent staff was ''unsustainable''.
Central Stories is not only the main social and natural history museum in the Central Otago district, it is also the major public art gallery for both the Central Otago and Queenstown-Lakes districts.
