This week, Bath BID Chief Executive Allison Herbert has been working on the citywide Bath at Christmas campaign, meeting with members of the night-time economy for our Safe and Secure Bath meeting, and representing Business Improvement Districts in the High Streets Task Force’s Platform project…
“This week, I have been coordinating the BID’s contribution to the Bath at Christmas project to ensure all activities are brought together under one PR umbrella and we get the message out that Bath is open for Christmas and that the city’s businesses will be putting a sparkle into the season. I am working closely with Kathryn Davis of Visit Bath to give the businesses a fighting chance of a good Christmas period with the absence of a large Christmas market.
“Alongside our coordination role, BID’s contribution will be a lighting trail in conjunction with B&NES Council, building on last year’s really successful light trail. We are planning to launch the trail and late-night shopping on a Thursday with a traditional community Christmas Light Switch On on 25th November, subject to permission from the council. As I am sure you can imagine, there is a lot of form-filling and work behind the scenes to bring this forward!
“For Christmas, we are pulling together a group of businesses who want to get involved and support the success of Bath at Christmas. Our Bath at Christmas Action Group will be driving forward the activity which we need to ‘make things happen’.
“Strategically, the BID is the best placed organisation in Bath to create those connections between businesses, and I believe that we are making huge progress since our ballot in April in this work.
“For example, we had a great meeting of our Safe and Secure Bath (formerly Nightwatch/Pubwatch) group this week, including a lively discussion on how best to ensure that the city is a safe place to visit after dark. Since reopening, so many city centre businesses have been working collaboratively to support each other through this rebuilding phase. It was great to have so many offers of help coming through this week’s meeting. At the meeting, it was agreed that the city would reenergise the ‘Ask For Angela’ scheme in Bath. This initiative has never been more pertinent and I am personally delighted that we are focussing efforts into bringing it back to Bath.
“The next phase of the Platform project met on Thursday. I am very pleased to be the BID representative on this nationwide research group which has been brought together by the High Streets Task Force to look at community occupation of vacant premises. It is a great honour to have the opportunity to hear best practice examples from experts in a range of high street fields and to bring our experiences in supporting activities in empty shops to that conversation.”
