Weymouth BID’s investment in Weymouth’s FIRST ever month long BIG Christmas festival, 4th-31st December, is set to entertain locals and visitors with a 21-day programme of activity and Weymouth’s first real ice rink, as well as excite businesses with dazzling sponsorship opportunities.
Weymouth’s BIG Christmas, held from the 4th-31st December, is going to give locals and visitors a real Christmas experience and extend the celebrations with an exciting programme including weekend events leading up to the 25thstarting with the BIG Christmas Shownight on Friday 4th.
Suggestions from local retailers and business made regarding previous Christmas events were that the two day Shownight should be extended to increase activity throughout December. Weymouth BID has acted upon this to create Weymouth’s BIG Christmas.
The festival will have a 21-day programme with weekend events including partnering Weymouth Pavilion to create a ‘pop-up panto’ and, after the success of June’s Out Loud Festival, a collaboration with the Weymouth and Portland Lions Club for a Christmas Out Loud weekend. On 4thDecember Father Christmas will arrive in town escorted by his two reindeer to the special grotto which has been created in Cineworld where he will take up residence until the 24th. The real ice rink will be open until the 23rdwith schools and groups open to take bookings during the week, reservations can be made at the Weymouth BID.
Steve Newstead, Weymouth BID Chair, said “We have gained experience from the Christmas events held in 2013 and 2014, the team have listened to ideas from town centre businesses who wanted activity throughout the month. During December events, Weymouth can see footfall traffic increase to over 300,000 visitor movements at the weekends. The BIG Christmas will cover a 21-day programme with THREE weekends of activity which will be fantastic for businesses and sponsors.
The BID will be recording the visitor movements in Weymouth town centre with the footfall cameras which were installed in 2014. This December the BID will have valuable like-for-like data to compare visitor numbers and movements.”
With the BIG event spanning December, Weymouth’s BIG Christmas is a perfect chance for businesses to make the most of increased footfall in the town centre through sponsorship. The We Are Weymouth brand is estimated to reach 1 million visitors within a 1 hour drive time to Weymouth. Sponsorship opportunities include an exclusive Gold package, three Silver packages, five Category packages with options to sponsor the BIG Christmas Tree, the BIG Christmas Grotto, ice rink tickets, ice rink banners and more. For more details visit the sponsor’s page on the events microsite at www.weareweymouth.co.uk/christmas
Henri Lloyd and Goadsby Estate Agents have already registered an interest in sponsorship of the BIG Christmas event with the Weymouth BID.
Nigel Reed, BID Manager, said “Some large multiple retailers and services have already put forward their interest. We have made sure that the sponsorship opportunities reflect a range of prices and exposure so that there is something for every size of business.
We are once again working with local media partners, Dorset Echo and Wessex FM, to provide BID Members the opportunity of discounted advertising before Christmas.”.
Find out more information about sponsorship and the full schedule at the event’s website at www.weareweymouth.co.uk/christmas and www.weymouthbid.co.uk
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For more information regarding the discounted Christmas advertising, Weymouth BID or WeAreWeymouth website please contact Nigel Reed, Manager on 01305 779410.
