Scarborough to Become Cannes of Britain......

Yorkshire Post Article: 

Business leaders believe Scarborough has the potential to become the 'Cannes of Britain' as part of a strategy to bring jobs and investment to the North Yorkshire Coast.

A marketing campaign - 'It's a coast thing' - was launched in front of an audience of dozens of entrepreneurs and community leaders. The campaign promotes Scarborough, Whitby and Filey as a place to do business. It aims to build on Scarborough's success in being voted Britain's most enterprising town.

'It's a coast thing' follows Scarborough's inaugural International Business Forum (IBF) which was held in the town's Spa Complex in November. Local business leaders had the chance to find out about the work being carried out by the public and private sectors to promote Scarborough at a dinner being held in the town's Beiderbecks Hotel.

The 80 guests watched a presentation by Natasha Mudar of Sterling Media, who worked with Scarborough Business Association on the IBF. She said: 'Scarborough has reinvented itself - it's a cool destination. It's for your hip, trendy, high net-worth individual traveller. The interest is already there. It's a sleeping beauty that has already been awakened. Scarborough has the business and the lifestyle opportunities.

She added: 'In terms of positioning as a cool destination we strongly feel it could become the Cannes of Britain, as part of a wider integrated campaign. If we're positioning it as the Cannes of Britain, we can definitley host film festivals here and align the town with more international events.'

Peter Wilkinson, the vice-chairman of Scarborough's Renaissance Town Team, said he believed it was possible to turn Scarborough into Britain's answer to Cannes, which is best known for hosting a film festival.

He added: 'We need to work at it but I believe it's achievable. Here we are on the coast with a beautiful sea-side setting, which is a great backdrop for films. What we are doing is setting our stall out for film producers to consider us as a place to produce films and also as a place to premiere them. If we can attract investment the sky's the limit.'

Nick Taylor, Scarborough's Renaissance Manager, said: 'Could Scarborough become the Cannes of Britain? It's an interesting thought. I was talking to a man from Standard Fireworks a few years ago and he said this must be the second best natural amphitheatre in Europe after Monte Carlo. Whether we could put on a big film festival is a very exciting and very challenging thought. When we first started talking about a renaissance project a few years ago, a lot of people said it would never happen. But our Jazz festival is an example of what can be achieved.'

He added: 'It started off with a very successful jazz club in Scarborough and they set up a jazz festival. Within five years it has become one of the top five European jazz festivals.'

The IBF highlighted the steps being taken in Scarborough to make it attractive as a place for inward investors. Much work to regenerate Scarborough has been taken by the Scarborough Business Association. It has worked closely with stakeholders such as Scarborough Council, Yorkshire Forward, Science City York, Business Link and york-england.com.

Mr Taylor added: 'Winning the title of Britain's most enterprising town will be a massive bonus to us. If you speak to the guys at business link they are being absolutely snowed under with the amount of enquiries they are getting.'

The Sands - Sea Front Apartments will be joining the 'Its A Coast Thing' campaign, so keep an eye out for the logo on this site.

Cheers

Web Team 

Categories: latest-news | 2009