Report - January 09

• Christmas cracker/shopping - Generally reckoned to be one of the best ever Cracker with more publicity than before (BID paid for ads in Marshwood Vale all 12 issues of the View From papers covering Dorset, Devon and Somerset, Primetime schools magazine and the Bournemouth Echo).

  The colourful projections onto buildings gave a wonderful effect and we got a great response from the public. Lasers smoke and snow all added to the fun and helped make things a little different. Lessons could be learnt for next year and in particular perhaps some local cafes/restaurants/pubs missed a trick by not providing hot food, snacks drinks from stalls in the streets. There was a real lack of food choice on stalls. Next time it will be better I am sure and those who did sell on the street had a great night! What an opportunity to promote your wares and your business?

• Park and Ride - P&R DBID helped resolve issues with parking and negotiated a deal that allowed the buses to run late on the 3 nights from the Football club. A big thank you to DTFC for their assistance together with great support from both WDDC and DCC.
• Website design activity - Website design activity - Business directory growing well, now over 100 businesses on the site. The TIC is now using it to help steer visitors/shoppers to the right place! Using the keyword search, they can print out a list of businesses to go to and even a location map/photo!

  Can everyone please try and encourage their fellow business friends in the BID area to REGISTER and then do their business directory entry.

• Bag project update - Bags now available to all BID businesses at a heavily discounted rate. The cotton/canvas bags are selling for £1/£2 giving fantastic value to the public but offering a good margin to the business.

  There are fifty under secretaries coming down from London soon and DCC want to showcase the bag project and their involvement. Some good exposure in London for Dorchester town - each of them will be given a Welcome Pack. In addition to this the Echo will be providing a reader's offer to further promote the bags.

• Talk - I gave a talk to the Rotary club of Dorchester in early Jan. This was a year on from my first pre-ballot presentation and it seemed it was well received. We even have a new Voluntary Contributor as a result (Firewise). Another company just outside the DBID area that has joined as VC is the commercial lettings company BartlePye.
• Advertising: resort magazine - The DBID's effort to rally a concerted marketing effort in Resort resulted with 6 pages of coverage for Dorchester in this key tourism magazine, that was 6 pages more than last year!

  The DBID intends to continue offering subsidized advertising support to as many businesses as possible in the Spring/Summer issue 2009.

• Creche - This extra project is on hold until such a time a suitable company is found to offer the facility.

Report Archive

• July/August report
• September/November report

Report - March 09

• Recession - I had a useful meeting with Business Link, who promoted their services to businesses in trouble needing support. I alerted the registered Dorchester businesses to the facilities and help available from business link with assistance to businesses struggling in the current climate.
• Website activity - Continuing efforts on getting more DBID businesses onto the directory of our Dorchester website www.dorchesterdorset.com. We are getting there, up to 120 now. I am hoping to hit 200 by the end of this year. The DBID site you are looking at is still the 'backend' site for BID businesses with content being updated regularly with news and offers for DBID businesses.
• Town Promotion - Great coverage in Dorset Life magazine. Its official! Wellworths has to become this years extra tourist attraction. Next week national coverage to follow opening (this was quite simply phenomenal and way beyond everyone expectations). Town promotion meeting, we will have another stuffing of Welcome Packs session on the 10th. I have started investigating a fold out town map.
• Roundabouts - We have had a very generous offer from World Heritage (Tim) to fund and supply a Triceratops. Keir is working on this project at present, looking to get help from the contractor company which is to work on the roundabouts for the Highways Authority.
• Communication - Sent out lots of emails to businesses on various topics including Resort deal/training courses and encouragement to get into the business directory.
• Car parking - Meeting with Eugene Barns from WDDC who has agreed to supply car park data - still waiting. Discussions with WDDC consultant who is doing a big report about parking in Dorset. I stressed the very strong feelings across businesses and the public about the whole parking situation and the importance that we get POE.
• End of year report - Started report design ideas for the BID's first annual report.
• Litter bins - WDDC have no budget but trying to see if they can start the roll out process before April with a couple of new bins - More next meeting. Stop the drop team are looking to get a sample cig butt bin for us to look at with a view to help fund for distribution across town
• Deep cleaning - I am in contact with landlords of Hardye Arcade. Their representative tells me that they were considering smartening up the above eye level stuff this year and are happy to do something with DBID (we have offered to deep clean the pavement).