‘City’s TV exposure can spark economic boost’
OVER the past few years there has been no getting away from seeing Stoke-on-trent’s attractions and landmarks starring on primetime television.
With The Great Pottery Throw Down making its debut last Thursday on the American TV giant HBO’S recently launched streaming service HBO Max, Middleport Pottery could now benefit from a further screen tourism boost as a result of international exposure.
As a growing trend with the potential to help Stoke-on-trent stand out in a crowded market as a cultural destination, screen tourism refers to people being motivated to visit an attraction or location because it has been depicted in a television series or film.
Frequently regarded as an unconventional destination, Stoke-ontrent has been described as a ‘palimpsest’. A city in which the old and new mingle and the eye of the discerning tourist can seek out a host of unpredictable pleasures.
Which is why it is crucial to capitalise on national and international television exposure to induce residents and attract tourists to seek out the city’s myriad heritage and cultural tourism assets.
Venues and sites around the city have long been used as a film location. For example, Soulboy, The Girl with All the Gifts, and Jawbone were all filmed locally, as were Marvellous and the Oscarwinning short drama The Silent Child which starred and was co-produced by Caverswall-born Rachel Shenton.
An acclaimed living, breathing heritage attraction, Middleport Pottery is the location for the three series of the Great Pottery Throw Down currently being screened on HBO Max, and who could forget the pottery’s starring role in the last series of the globally televised Peaky Blinders?
As Gladstone Pottery Museum celebrates its status as the UK’S best small visitor attraction, it continues to promote its authentic film location credentials.
At the end of 2019 a production crew descended on the museum’s atmospheric bottle kiln-enclosed cobbled yard to shoot scenes for ‘The Irregulars’, a new twist on the classic tale of Sherlock Holmes which will premiere around the world exclusively on Netflix later this year.
The Lloyds Bank advert which featured the iconic black horse galloping across the dramatic Chatterley Whitfield landscape and through Trentham’s residential streets continued to be aired more than a year after it was first launched.
Whilst these provided potential storytelling opportunities to help ‘sell the city’, there are more purposeful tourismboosting examples of attractions being recently featured in popular television shows.
These include: Michael Portillo visiting the World of Wedgwood and trying his hand on the potter’s wheel as part of the Great British Railways Journeys programme; and Trentham Gardens prominently showcased by the BBC when starring in the Antiques Roadshow, Gardener’s World, and Songs of Praise.
Last Sunday’s Countryfile also featured Wedgwood and Trentham alongside Hem Heath Woods.
Interestingly, from a broader place marketing perspective, the Countryfile presenters referenced Stoke-on-trent as ‘one of the greenest cities in the UK with a can-do attitude and a global reputation for pioneering science and innovation’.
Following an initial inquiry to recommend places of interest and indeed people to be interviewed by Gyles Brandreth and Sheila Hancock for a forthcoming edition of Great Canal Journeys, it’s clear that Stoke-on-trent’s reputation as a location with a plentiful supply of interesting, filmable cultural resources and heritage assets is highly regarded.
The type of screen exposure outlined above which is essentially a form of ‘placeplacement’ has been relatively successful in raising the city’s profile and attracting visitors to some of the city’s tourist hotspots.
However, it can also provide more subtle, conscious and subconscious ways to creatively position and sell the city as part of an image transformation campaign to not only boost tourism, but also to help change external perceptions of the city, attract potential inward investors and deliver immediate and longer-term economic benefits.
Given the power and reach of television, many places are now looking to entice TV producers and film companies, which is why I believe that a coordinated, joined-up and appropriately resourced place-placement strategy should now be developed to fully leverage the city’s growing on-screen reputation.