Member Article

“I fell in love with the region when I arrived here 30 years ago says CEO Sarah Stewart of NGI

“I fell in love with the region when I arrived here 30 years ago, and since then I’ve always been a one person tourism board for the North East,” says Sarah Stewart. In this light, it is little wonder that she was appointed to the role of chief executive at destination marketing agency NewcastleGateshead Initiative just over a year ago.

Since Sarah came to NewcastleGateshead Initiative, much has changed. “Four days after I began my post there was a general election, which caused much change,” Sarah recounts. “We witnessed the disbanding of regional support structures, as well as a reduction in budgets, but we were incredibly lucky that the local councils chose to maintain their levels of support for the organisation.”

“As a public-private organisation with a diverse range of funding sources, we have since more robust than many similar organisations and are still constantly striving to ensure we can retain funding from our commercial income sources.”

During the past year, Sarah and her team have worked tirelessly to promote the region as a great place to “live, learn, work, visit and invest”. Her work to improve the regions image has also been recognised by the Tourism Minister John Penrose MP, who recently appointed her to the board of VisitEngland.

“This was a great opportunity, because it gave me the chance to deal with tourism on a national basis, and allowed me to accurately gauge the picture on a larger scale,” she said.

The problems facing the tourism industry have been well publicised, but despite this Sarah still feels optimistic: “Six new hotels have been built in Gateshead and Newcastle over the past year, illustrating the confidence developers have in the region.

“When the tourism minister engaged in discussion with businesses in the North East, he was encouraged by the efforts many in the region are taking in getting on with what needs to be done to retain our profile and position.”

Looking forward, NewcastleGateshead Initiative and their partners are looking to further develop the place brand for the destination: “With our partners in Newcastle and Gateshead we are looking at how we can collectively describe all of the good things about the region, by creating a storybook for the region.

“There has been so much investment in the region’s cultural infrastructure over the past 10 years, but we need to continue to reinforce the positive message to encourage more people to come to the region.”

Inevitably I ask Sarah what her favourite thing about the region is, and her answer is one which I’m sure many of us would agree on: “It’s a small region, so you have all the benefits of an urban area with shops, theatres and museums, but you’re never more than 30 minutes away from the countryside or a beach. It’s fantastic.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .