‘Make more use of city’s unique offer’
FORMER Friends of Gladstone chairman Phil Rowley makes interesting points about the axing of about a dozen staff at Gladstone Pottery Museum following Stoke-on-trent City Council budget cuts (Sentinel, May 12).
Whereas the museum has all the potential to be a cash cow for the city, it almost seems to be regarded by the council as a liability.
It is all very well saying that it is feasible to run Gladstone and the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery by reducing manpower and with the same team looking after both sites, but who is buying that argument?
In any industry, cutbacks and retrenchment only ever lead to vastly-diminished customer service, poorer
quality and damaged public perception.
In making these changes, the city is playing right into the hands of outsiders who insist on seeing Stokeon-trent as a provincial backwater.
Yes, the city has some exciting projects in the pipeline, but the asset rationalisation that is unfolding at the moment is creating a situation where we cannot speak of the tourism
potential of Stoke-on-trent with any confidence.
I vividly recall the time in the 1990s when the council had a tourism department, helmed by talented, creative people such as Jane Randall and Julie Obada – people who would travel far and wide or pick up a phone and sell, sell, sell Stoke-on-trent and its splendid attractions.
That department was one of the first victims of budget cuts.
While I accept that there have to be sacrifices when money is really short, recent developments have emasculated Stoke-ontrent’s tourism appeal.
An ambitious and aspirational city council would lay less emphasis on saving money and more emphasis on creating wealth through the city’s acknowledged unique selling points.
MERVYN EDWARDS WOLSTANTON