Professor Jonathan Deacon, director of the University of South Wales’s Centre for Research in Entrepreneurship and Marketing, reflects on the Newport Brand, and why it is a unique selling point that could provide massive opportunities for the city

We live in a world where everything is branded – even the word brand is a brand.

We also live in a world where the scarcity of media no longer exists and - due to the democratisation of media and the development of social media platforms – not only has communication become faster, it has become cheap and most of all it has been placed in the hands of our fellow citizens.

Given this background, what then, can be said about the ‘Newport Brand’, as a ‘destination brand’, but a brand within the City Region?

The definition of a destination brand lends itself to a potential framework for further discussion:

• A brand is a dynamic interaction between the destination’s assets and the way in which potential visitors perceive them,

• A brand is the DNA that defines the destination. It runs through every act of marketing communication,

• A destination brand represents the “core essence and enduring characteristics of a destination”,

• 'Destination brand' refers to a destination’s competitive identity.

The perception of Newport is somewhat a self-fulfilment of the way in which the city has been presented through the mass media – either as a place best avoided (negative reports abound - traffic, red light zone, poor shopping, parking issues, business closure) or as (and almost exclusively as) the home of the Celtic Manor Resort.

Both media perceptions are, at best, misleading and, at worse, fail to reflect the true character of the city.

The civic communication of Brand Newport is, and has been for a long time, the obvious outcome of committee think, albeit well meaning, I’m sure.

To put it bluntly: there is little consistency across either message or image and, in the world of brand development and social media, such an approach is unlikely to gain attention, build an audience, and is a waste of precious resource.

For a simple illustration of this – take a look at the variety of civic signage used throughout the city – different logos, images, heraldic devices and colours will greet you in a rainbow of brand confusion.

Then we come to Newport’s core essence, the enduring characteristics of a city with a rich political, industrial and creative history.

Newport is the birthplace of Chartism – a political movement that is both central to our wider democracy and as pertinent today as it was in 1838.

Let’s not talk about the ‘mosaic’ incident in detail – but instead think about how such a political history should be valued as a unique signifier of the city and how it reflects the characteristics of its citizens.

Newport is and has been a hard-working urban industrial town, a port , a place of ideas and the mixing of cultures – such characteristics can be the platform of a new generation of urban industry – focused upon adding value to engineering both manufacturing and digital.

And what of the city’s entrepreneurial and creative heritage? A long and rich creative seam runs through the city, not just a creative artistic culture but a creative entrepreneurial one too.

Upon reflection, it is perhaps the artists and entrepreneurs of Newport that have placed the city on the brand map in recent times – from fashion to photography, game design to telecoms.

However, these are not endeavours exclusively created by slick corporate organisations, but have come out of the edgy, arty, creative, non-conformist, post-industrial, authentic, witty, smart and cosmopolitan sub cultures that exist within the talented youth of Newport. We have to be honest and embrace the fact that Newport is far from beige.

It is an important point, as in an age where authentic creativity is the foundation of competitive destination advantage (and thus a brand), because it attracts the next generation of talent (just take a look at Shoreditch, in London for example) and it is talent which creates the next generation of businesses.

Richard Florida talks about the three ‘Ts’ of destination advantage from an economic development perspective, as a basis for developing a Brand Newport it could be argued we have them as engrained civic characteristics (and always have) – Tolerance, Technology and Talent – and let’s be honest, other corporate, colourless and congested cities would love to have them!

The concept of a city region is a sound one, it will create a critical mass of business and skilled people, it will help us collectively build a better global brand – but we also have an opportunity within it to add colour, edge and excitement.