Is there a future for your high street?
An opportunity to reposition, reinvent, rebrand and restructure your high street to make it sustainable in 2020.
HMV, Comet, Clinton Cards, JJB Sports, Blockbuster, and Thomas Cook are just some of the retailers who have closed all or some of their high street outlets in the last twelve months. Forecasts are clear that this trend will continue and the outlook for many high streets is challenging if not bleak.
The Economic and Social Research Council recognises the importance of the high street and the contribution that retail makes to the economy and society, and is looking to commission knowledge exchange projects that will assist those managing change in town and city centres. There is already a wealth of research examining the forces of change and potential interventions but this knowledge is not readily available to those who are seeking to provide solutions to local high streets. In response to this, Manchester Metropolitan University is looking for partners for its High Street UK 2020 bid. This aims to transfer knowledge and understanding about high street and retail change directly to local actors and agencies so they can reposition, reinvent, rebrand and restructure their high street to make it sustainable from 2020.
The High Street UK 2020 bid is led by Professor Cathy Parker, Chair of Marketing and Retail Enterprise and co-author of Parliament’s High Street Britain 2015 report, with Simon Quin, co-author of the influential Vital and Viable Town Centres: Meeting the Challenge report and former Chief Executive of the Association of Town Centre Management (ATCM). We seek partners from both the retail and retail support sectors and around ten local high streets for a year-long project that will bring cutting-edge research on retail and the high street directly to local communities so they can implement appropriate interventions to reposition, reinvent, rebrand, and restructure their local high street to secure its future for 2020.
If funded, the project will draw together evidence from latest research on retailing and high street change and will exchange knowledge through a series of local workshops, regional thematic seminars and online support centre. These resources will be available free of charge to our local high street partners, giving unrivalled access to research normally unattainable by local partnerships. In exchange, each local high street will host a workshop and to appoint a research user group who will participate in other events during the course of the year and work alongside the project team to identify their research needs.  Reasonable travel costs for attending national/regional events will be met by the project.
If you would like to know more or be part of this exciting bid then please contact Simon Quin (simon@placemanagement.org).