MotoFest £10m boost for city’s economy
COVENTRY’S growing MotoFest extravaganza is estimated to have contributed a whopping £10m to the city’s economy in 2018.
Now the largest free urban motorsport festival in the UK, this year’s festival saw the first competitive motorsports held on a city centre circuit in almost 30 years.
The £10m figure was calculated working in partnership with Coventry Business Improvement District (BID), sponsors and exhibitors.
Based on average spend, business uplift, visitor footfall and hotel occupancy rates, the number crunching revealed the event - officially known as Power Maxed MotoFest Coventry - injected approximately £10m into the local economy.
The two-day festival in June has been running for five years now and is growing in popularity as each year passes.
This year saw a 35 per cent uplift in the spend to city centre businesses.
In addition footfall was up by 25 per cent, with more than 136,000 people recorded in the city on both days of the festival.
This also represented the highest number of visitors to Coventry for a specific event so far in 2018.
Hotel room occupancy rates reached 98 per cent - which equated to 4,655 of the 4,706 hotel rooms available in the city being occupied.
MotoFest director James Noble said: “It’s great to know we are providing a £10m boost to the city by filling the tills, hotel rooms and the city centre itself during the festival weekend.
“Working with our partners, we have sought to calculate the impact of the event based on a range of data available to us.”
Mr Noble added that the £10m figure represented a “conservative estimate” - due to the way data was collected.
He said: “Overall we think it’s quite a conservative estimate as we don’t have a complete picture for some areas such as footfall figures.
“For instance there are no footfall cameras in Friargate and Warwick Row but we do know that this is a key event location that attracts large numbers of visitors.
“So when you factor in missing data from those locations, the 136,000 estimate is probably closer to around 150,000 - which puts us close to Goodwood Festival of Speed visitor numbers.
“The hotel occupancy room rate figures are almost unprecedented for the city and well above the 60 - 65 per cent room occupancy rate normally seen across an average weekend in the city.
“It motivates us to continue developing and growing Power Maxed MotoFest Coventry and reinforcing its status as the largest urban motorsports festival in the UK.”
Adam Weaver, managing director of Automotive Brands, parent company of Power Maxed, added: “We have been involved for a few years now, each year increasing our involvement and are incredibly proud to be involved. We just can’t wait to help make the event even better in 2019.”
Coventry BID director Trish Willetts said: “Year after year MotoFest Coventry proves an excellent event for the city bringing in thousands of visitors.
“Many of our businesses had a fantastic weekend at this year’s event, it was extremely successful for them and these figures show that.
“MotoFest puts Coventry on the map and Coventry BID looks forward to continuing our successful partnership with the team and we cannot wait to see what they come up with next year.”
LE Projects, which operates The Litten Tree and The Yard, was one business which saw a significant uplift in trade over the course of the two-day motoring festival.
Richard Easter, from LE Projects, said: “Both The Yard and The Litten Tree benefitted from a huge increase in footfall throughout the weekend, resulting in an overall uplift in turnover of around 50 per cent.
“The MotoFest weekend brought a great buzz to the city and I look forward to next year.”
Louise Wall, group commercial director at Coventry and Warwickshire Chamber of Commerce, said: “The positive impact of this event on the regional economy is fantastic to see, with a range of businesses benefitting from its growth in such a short space of time since MotoFest was first held in the city.”