Visit West, the official Local Visitor Economy Partnership for the West of England, has today announced a bold new identity to bring together its brands.

This builds on the rebranding of its Convention Bureau – formally known as Meet Bristol and Bath - earlier this year and brings together all the organisation’s industry facing brands under a more unified identity, strengthening the Visit West brand and celebrating the wider region. Travel trade activity and engagement will now come under a new ‘Visit West Travel Trade’ brand while the organisation’s two consumer flagship brands Visit Bath and Visit Bristol, have also been given a stylish upgrade.   

Alongside the refreshed branding, Visit West has unveiled a redesigned corporate website, offering a more intuitive and comprehensive resource for businesses operating within the visitor economy locally and those wishing to know more. The new website, designed by Granicus Destinations, benefits from enhanced functionality and user experience. A new website dedicated to the travel trade audience will be launched later this summer.

The West of England is much more than two cities. While Bristol and Bath provide strong recognition, particularly for international audiences, the wider region also offers an extraordinary breadth of experiences across city, coast and countryside.

Jon Chamberlain, Head of Marketing for Visit West, said: “I am delighted to reveal the new Visit West family of brands with a new Visit West website at the same time. The new branding and guidelines brings years of work together under a more coherent identity and sets us up for the future. Our popular consumer brands have had a glow up and our B2B brands have been renamed to better bring them into the Visit West stable, reinforcing our reputation in the industry.”

 

 

Visit West partnered with Stuff, a Bristol-based creative agency, to develop its new brand identity. Richard Spruce, Creative Director at Stuff, said: "We were delighted to be entrusted with such an important project for the region. Visit West plays a vital role in promoting one of the UK's most diverse and exciting destinations, so creating a brand that could bring the region together while supporting its long-term ambitions was a real privilege.

The new identity has been designed to strengthen recognition of the region by using the globally recognised cities of Bristol and Bath, while encouraging visitors to explore beyond the two cities. The strapline, Bristol, Bath & Beyond, helps clarify Visit West’s geographical location and reflects the breadth of experiences the region has to offer. By encouraging visitors to discover more of the region, it supports longer, multi-centre stays, a key objective of the Visit West Destination Management Plan.”

The brand repositioning comes on the back of a strong year for the Visit West team. Visit Bath and Visit Bristol consumer websites saw over 6.8million session starts and reached over 23million users on social media. The team hosted more than 150 media visits from across the world, generating more than 1,000 pieces of coverage with an estimated 34million views worldwide. Over the past 12 months, the Visit West Convention Bureau team handled business events enquiries with a combined value of more than £3million, working on a range of bids for events with partners, from conferences to sports to culture. 

Working across the Convention Bureau and the Travel Trade teams, Visit West have also hosted over 150 buyers looking to develop business in the region from UK, France, USA, China, Italy, Brazil, Spain and more.