A Brand New St Helens

This is a shortened reproduction of a Press Release from 23/10/07 launching the borough's latest initiative - A Brand New St.Helens

For further details please see the contact details at the bottom of the post.

St.Helens Council has launched "Brand New St.Helens", the Borough’s first ever integrated branding and destination marketing initiative, aimed at promoting "St.Helens plc" and showcasing the positive "post-industrial revolution" underway.

The new branding identifies St.Helens as the "Heart of the Northwest" to highlight the Borough’s location, connectivity, regional significance, and passionate "Northern soul". This is supported by a new St.Helens Visitor Guide, packed with details of the Borough’s rich tourism and leisure offer, plus a Development Review publication that highlights the spectacular ongoing physical transformation of St.Helens in terms of infrastructure, business developments, tourism and leisure schemes, public services, and residential development.

Central to Brand New St.Helens are the four key themes that will direct the marketing campaigns to be delivered.

"Connectivity, Catchment, Cost" highlights the Borough’s appeal as an accessible, cost effective business base for new and additional investment.

"Home of Champions" seeks to promote St.Helens’ winning business environment, which offers some of the best business support in the Northwest, not least via the best Chamber in the UK.

The existing http://www.investinsthelens.com/ website has undergone a complete revamp to support both these themes.

"Discover your Doorstep" is aimed at getting locals and day visitors alike to appreciate and utilise the Borough’s tourism and leisure assets, and is being accompanied by a major upgrade of http://www.visitsthelens.com/.

Last but not least is the "be POSH!" theme aimed at instilling and bringing out local pride. This will be rolled out via a dedicated website, http://www.beposh.info/, which highlights the many remarkable facts, people and other reasons there are to be Proud of St.Helens – POSH for short! People can put forward their own POSH suggestions, not just to herald events and celebrities past and present, but also to celebrate ordinary local people who are achieving extra-ordinary things.

The ultimate goal is to benefit the Borough’s businesses, residents and economy as a whole by attracting added investment and tourism. This will be achieved by raising the general profile of the Borough, enhancing St.Helens' overall image, and encouraging and increasing local pride.
Councillor Brian Spencer, the Leader of St.Helens Council comments: "There is a remarkable transformation taking place in St.Helens - Barclays Bank recently cited St.Helens as one of the top 11 places in the UK in terms of business start-up growth, while one of the world’s foremost artists has been commissioned to create an internationally significant new artwork here as part of Channel 4’s Big Art Project.

"The time has therefore come to adopt a more direct, confident, consistent and quality-focused approach to marketing the Borough, in order to capitalise on our prime location and connectivity at the centre of the Northwest region.

"Brand New St.Helens is in effect about promoting "St.Helens plc" – i.e. the Borough and its assets as a profitable business base, desirable residential location, and appealing visitor destination.

"We are positive that other local and external stakeholders will want to buy into the new branding and materials, to help take the promotion of St.Helens and its many positives to a new level."

For more information, visit the http://www.theheartofthenorthwest.com/ portal website or contact Laura Hutchings, Economic Development Marketing Officer at St.Helens Council, on 01744 671 749, 07747 762 167 or via laurahutchings@sthelens.gov.uk.