Plymouth, England, is about to receive an unprecedented £4.4 billion pound government investment into the dockyard and naval base to support the UK’s national defence. Facing this once-in-a-generation opportunity – and tasked with creating up to 25,000 new jobs in the city over the coming decade – Plymouth needed to rethink how it communicated itself to the world. Amanda Lumley, CEO of Destination Plymouth, joined us to explore how they’ve evolved their place brand strategy to seize this opportunity and ensure a thriving future for their community.

You’ve been through a really interesting journey recently, Amanda, because Destination Plymouth has transitioned from tourism-centric to a holistic place organisation. What prompted the change?

Plymouth as a city is seeing significant investment in regeneration right now, but the change process started around two years ago in 2023. As the city came out of the COVID-19 pandemic and things started to return to a new normal, our Board of Directors was considering the whole ‘where are we now’ question.

Destination Plymouth had been in existence since 2010 and was responsible for growing its visitor economy successfully from just under 4 million to over 5.4 million visitors annually in the nine years prior to COVID. During that time, in 2013, the city developed our ‘Plymouth Britain’s Ocean City’ (BOC) brand which has been very successful at positioning Plymouth as a great place to visit over the past ten years.

Based on the growth trajectory for the city, the Board agreed that as the visitor sector was still in recovery more emphasis was required on Plymouth as a place to live, work and study. It was agreed that Destination Plymouth should lead a brand review process with the aim of creating a new brand strategy to drive growth across key sectors of the local economy and positively re-position Plymouth.

Any strategic shift this substantial comes with challenges. What have you had to overcome along the way?

Over the past two years we have had a bit of a roller coaster journey to be honest. As a small Destination Management Organisation, we have had challenges with funding and resources as many others across the country have faced.

Very early on in the process, we did a city-wide survey working with Alder and Alder, a local Devon-based consultancy, to sense check how the local community and key city organisations felt about the existing ‘Britain’s Ocean City’ branding. What came back was really positive with resounding support for the city brand, however, there were some key insights which have influenced our approach to the whole process. Many city organisations felt that the city brand was an asset of the City Council, so the majority of organisations outside the Council wouldn’t consider using it. For some organisations, an association with the BOC brand would undermine perceptions of their own brand. It was felt that this made it inaccessible and many leading city organisations could not see how they could use it an align with their activity.

The brand hierarchy within the city means that many organisational brands are very prominent. Stakeholders felt that the BOC brand needs to be much more visible and that the BOC brand lacked meaning, questioning what it stood for. One described it as “just a strapline” and another commented, “When you stand on the Hoe, it all makes sense”. But this statement raises the question: Does the BOC brand still make sense if you’re living in a lower income area of the city, with no access to the waterfront?

On the back of this research, it was agreed to set up a multi stakeholder and cross city/community ‘Brand development group’ to consider how to refresh the BOC branding and create a clear story and narrative for the city, showcasing all the positive benefits of living here. We also had to engage with as many communities and organisations as possible from grass roots upwards to get a feel for the true internal perspectives on the city.

Alongside this it was agreed we would commission some external perception research to look at how the city was perceived externally along with some support to redefine the narratives and create a new visual approach. A fundamental part of the process has been to engage early on with communities and stakeholders right across the city to get a true sense of what they believe is special about their local place but also to give a sense of ownership as we have developed the city’s overarching story and narrative messages.

Your new city narrative is to “Make Life an Adventure.” Can you talk us through how you arrived at this north star for your strategy?

As part of our brand development process, we procured two organisations to work with us. PRD, who did our initial perception research to help us to understand external perceptions of the city and also to explore what talent attraction opportunities there are in our specific growth sectors, and global place branding agency DNCO to help us to understand how those opportunities would translate into a new story for the city but also a vibrant new creative approach. The teams have both been just amazing to work with and have helped us navigate complex engagement processes, listened proactively to our local communities and our needs, and truly helped us to realise what a special place Plymouth is.

The research identified four key opportunities to distinguish Plymouth from other cities across the UK.

• The Ocean is Plymouth’s most recognisable and powerful asset, and the full potential of this special connection has yet to be realised.
• Plymouth’s Quality of Life is greater than other similar cities, with evidence to prove it.
• Talent all over the UK is looking for opportunities for growth and the city is at the forefront of innovation in many fields, but not yet known for it.
• Plymouth’s cultural offer and creative industries have huge potential and can shift the perception of the city

Using the research as a sound evidence base, the team worked with consultants DNCO to create new ways of thinking about the city, which form the key storylines in the brand strategy:

• ‘Over 500 years of innovation’, to reflect the city’s heritage and its evolution from port town to leading centre for marine research, marine autonomy, and naval defence, with over 38% of employment in England’s marine industries in the city.
• ‘The horizons are bigger here’, showcasing the huge growth potential and career opportunities with over 25,000 jobs over the next 10 years in the city.
• ‘Plymouth's creativity knows no bounds’, highlighting the city’s growing creative industries and production sector, cultural renaissance, and the role of creativity in driving innovation across sectors.
• ‘The city wild about nature’ – the only UK city to be between a national park and national marine park with multiple designations of protected marine and green spaces. Plymouth has a much better quality of life and work life balance to comparator cities, based on ONS data on happiness, wellbeing and activity levels.
• ‘A community that goes beyond’, nearly one third of the city’s population are active volunteers. Plymothians are welcoming, supportive and fiercely loyal to each other. There are multiple grass root organisations and a real community spirit across the city.

• 'We’re charting an exciting future' - A city centre transformation alongside a broader £6 billion pipeline investment into the city

Joy Nazzari, Founder of DNCO, commented “The six storylines reflect what we saw and heard when we spent time in Plymouth, a city of remarkable heritage, world-class natural assets, economic potential and a community that is both warm and forward-looking.

“DNCO has worked in cities across the world, but Plymouth is distinctive, a city of substance and opportunity with growing national and international relevance. We wanted to capture that with authenticity, which is why we ran a series of co-creation workshops and open sessions — to listen carefully to the people who know it best and to reflect what they value most about the place they call home.”

You’ve clearly done really comprehensive engagement over the past two years. What is your advice for ensuring that partners – both public and private – are excited to use the brand story?

I think it is really important to have a core group of city organisations and partners who will go on the journey with you to provide ideas, input, support, and act as critical friends. We chose people who understood the place, brand concept, and are passionate about showcasing the city, but also leaders across city networks so we had a mechanism to have dialogue more broadly as we developed the concepts. We included a number of grass roots organisations who helped particularly with community consultation and enabling us to understand some of the challenges our local residents are facing on the ground and therefore how they might perceive the city and the work we have been doing.

A crucial part of engagement was also ensuring that the city’s senior leadership felt ownership for the process and was supportive at key stages throughout. We have had fantastic support from the Leader and Deputy Leader of the City Council, as well as the City’s Chief Executive who have helped enable the process with grant funding and human resources. Additionally, we benefitted from funding support from some of the city’s leading businesses including Babcock, Princess Yachts, University of Plymouth, The Box and Arts University Plymouth.

The Vice Chancellor of Arts University Plymouth, Prof. Paul Fieldsend Danks, chaired the Brand Development group over the past 18 months and subsequently has just stepped into the role as Destination Plymouth’s interim chair. It is exciting to have new leadership, a new brand strategy, and some world class narratives and visuals from our colleagues at DNCO to drive the city forwards.

How can place teams make sure that brand, marketing, and communications have a voice at the top decision-making tables?

It is always a challenge having a strong voice in a very competitive environment where funding is continuously challenging and marketing and communications are not always seen as priorities. I think the first thing is to always make the case for support and, where possible, underpin with evidence to demonstrate that place brand marketing and communications can make a difference.

Ideally you need to ensure that you have senior city leadership on your Board and you are on cross city networks and that you are weaving your activities into broader cross cutting city strategies. For example, the current Visitor Plan is embedded into the city’s local development framework up to 2032. We will take the new Brand Strategy to the City council’s cabinet in October for adoption as a city strategy. The process has just started to refresh the Plymouth Plan up to 2050 and we will work as part of the task group to ensure that the new brand narratives are woven throughout this, along with some of the brand strategy’s strategic objectives and tactical delivery requirements. There are significant growth objectives and opportunities for the city in terms of housing, employment, and regeneration and none of this will be achieved without a strong city brand and positive perception of our special place. At the end of the day, we want to ensure we’re able to ‘make life an adventure’ in  Plymouth, Britain’s Ocean City.

Thanks so much for sharing that, Amanda. 

Destination Plymouth’s Amanda Lumley will be joining us at City Nation Place UK this September 24-25^th to discuss how place leadership teams can manage change, create connections, and deliver growth for their communities – even when on a tight budget. See the full agenda here or check out our ticket packages here to learn more.