The ‘Adventure Generator’ has landed

My feet haven’t touched the ground during the last few weeks. Following the Berghaus spring/summer 2010 sales conference and a great camping break with my family, it’s been all hands on deck at Press Ahead. In fact, the outdoor theme is continuing, and then some. We’ve been working flat out on the development of an online application to help people plan visits to North East England and try their hand at outdoor activities. That is now ready and live and we’re proud to announce the launch of the Adventure Generator.

I reckon that the timing for this couldn’t be better. Terms like ‘staycation’ and ‘glamping’ are becoming common parlance and domestic outdoor activity providers and venues are reporting huge demand for their products and services. Research published earlier this year by the Outdoor Industries Association (OIA) revealed that 49% of the British adult population is more likely to eschew a foreign holiday and go on a UK based outdoor break during 2009, due to the economic downturn.

As well as this current trend of holidaying in the UK, for several years now there has been a consistent growth in the public’s appetite multi-activity outdoor adventures. Whereas in the past, someone might describe themselves as a walker or a cyclist, people these days want to try a multitude of outdoor activities, and sometimes all in one weekend or short break. This has implications for brands like Berghaus who make outdoor products, as people want items that will work for a range of pursuits. Kit such as the hugely popular Paclite Jacket is an example of how to get multi-activity product right. And so, in a different way, is the Adventure Generator.

The Adventure Generator clearly caters for the ‘staycation’ audience, but it also includes such a wide range of activity options from all over the North East that it’s perfect for anyone who’s ready for a weekend of varied outdoor adventures. All you need to do is ‘spin the wheels’ and find out what adventures the region has in store for you. You can spin again if the options don’t appeal and then the website provides you with all the information you need to plan your trip and your activities. You can even challenge your friends and family through the website.

Here at Press Ahead, we’re really pleased with the Adventure Generator. Based on our original concept, the actual design and programming was completed by our colleagues at Different. They’ve done a fantastic job (in my humble opinion) and the final product looks great, is really easy to use and wonderfully showcases the huge variety of outdoor activities available in North East England. Now comes the job of spreading the word as far and as wide as possible – feel free to play a part in that!

Outdoor adventures - global and local

I’ve had quite an ‘outdoorsy’ week, which has been very enjoyable. It began with me collecting this beast, which the Family Lines has just invested in. We looked at loads of great tents, but this was the one that really took our fancy – the size, layout, headroom and general quality all appealed. So, we made the choice and look forward to a bit of camping, or maybe even ‘glamping’, very soon.

Anticipating future nights under canvass I then set off for the unashamedly plush Carden Park near Chester, to attend the Berghaus spring/summer 2010 sales conference. There, delegates representing about 30 countries in which Berghaus products are sold, were presented with details of the range that will be available to consumers around the world from next February. I can’t spill the beans on all of that here, but suffice it to say there are (as there seem to be every season these days) some very exciting developments and plenty for Press Ahead to get its PR teeth stuck into.

Berghaus has an outstanding team of sponsored athletes and many of them attended and contributed to the conference this week. Sir Chris Bonington, Mick Fowler and Leo Houlding all gave inspirational presentations about their exploits and demonstrated very clearly how they are the personification of everything that is great about the Berghaus brand. Also at the conference were Anniken Binz, Rob Jarman, Leah Crane and Carlos Suarez – they are all very much part of an extended Berghaus family.

On Tuesday, I led a workshop that Berghaus marketing director Sarah Wilson and I put together for the international representatives. It was designed to give them an insight into how sponsorship can be used to build the brand (and subsequently sales) in their market, and to give them tips on how to create their own sponsorship strategies. Our magnificent seven Berghaus athletes were also involved in the workshop and it was a thoroughly enjoyable session that the audience seemed to both enjoy and find very useful.

One of the best aspects of a Berghaus sales conference is that it gives people involved in the business around the globe the opportunity to get to know each other and share best practice and ideas. At every conference, the company lays on some sort of team activity. This time delegates were split into mixed groups and then set a series of challenges in the grounds of Carden Park. My team included a few from the UK, including Berghaus brand president Richard Cotter, along with representatives from Spain, the Czech Republic and South Korea.

Over the course of a couple of hours, we tried a range of activities and challenges, with varying degrees of success. Our team ‘excelled’ at archery and climbing, but was less successful when it came to ‘laser’ clay pigeon shooting and building a tower of crates. It was all great fun and the sight of Richard Cotter and European sales director Simon Roberts racing each other up a telegraph pole was pretty entertaining. Simon, with reckless disregard to his career prospects, reached the top first and was then given the charming title of 'tree monkey' by Richard!

The images below were taken during the crate building exercise and provide an idea of the fun that was had. The guy balancing at, and then falling off, the top is Mike Clark, Berghaus' retail operations manager.

Overall, the conference was a big success, thanks to a huge amount of work put in by people across the business, from product design and development, sourcing and logistics, and of course the marketing team who co-ordinated the whole event. Well done to everyone involved – now comes the work of selling and promoting the new range!

I returned to the North East to find that the Outdoor and Active campaign up here is really starting to gather momentum. The media coverage in the region is starting to roll in, with a lot more activity in the pipeline. Meanwhile, the team at Press Ahead has been picking up the ’phone to national journalists and visits are being arranged as I type. We’ve got a really cool (can I use that word at my age?) initiative lined up to launch in June, that I think is going to have very wide appeal. I won’t reveal all now, but watch this space for more news on that soon.

So, yes, the outdoors has been the dominant theme of my week. And with the Bank Holiday weekend weather forecast looking quite promising up here in the glorious North East, I dare say I’ll be heading outside quite a bit more over the next few days.

A guide to alienating the nation, by the House of Commons

“The Mother of Parliaments” is a phrase sometimes used to describe the House of Commons. It was actually coined to refer to something else and anyway, at the moment, a more accurate description of that part of Westminster could be “The Mother of Expense Accounts”.

Yes, this has been a pretty awful week for the reputations of British politicians and our political institutions. The scandal of MPs’ expenses has been the elephant in the room for a while now and it finally started trumpeting loudly from the moment that the Telegraph published the first instalment of the leaked information it had acquired.

I won’t repeat the details here – there’s too much of it and it leaves such a bad taste that I’m not going to waste my energy. The point is that the sleaze that in the past tended to be associated with one party at a time, has on this occasion tainted them all. Each of the three main parties has culprits among its MPs. Collectively, the British public has witnessed this story develop with disgust (though interestingly I have not detected much surprise in the voxpops I have seen and heard) and has decided that politicians are collectively corrupt. That label can be added to all of the other less than flattering terms that we use to refer to them.

This really is not good and on this I have to take issue with Stephen Fry, much though I agree with some of his comments on the matter. Mr Fry is absolutely correct to point out that we should in general be more concerned with the macro political decisions that our MPs get right or wrong. However, although this whole brouhaha may be of little consequence in the broader context of war, poverty, health, education and global economic meltdown, I fear that the long term fall out could be profound and seriously harm engagement with our political system.

While the truth is that a large number of MPs have nothing to be ashamed of, they are all now well and truly tarred with the same brush (the cost of which was claimed back as it was used to creosote a garden fence at the second home of an unnamed backbencher). The consequences are going to be far reaching and their impact extends well beyond Westminster and the changes that will have to be made there.

We are privileged to live in a democracy and we can choose who governs at pretty much every level of our society. The problem is that more and more people are voting with their feet, rather than with a ballot paper. Since 1992, turnout in General Elections has dropped from 77% to 61% in 2005 (with a record post war low of 59% in 2001).

What can we expect next time? Younger voters are already disinterested in politics, while people who have consistently voted throughout their adult lives are disillusioned. I know – I’ve spoken to them (and they include my parents). Will the public be inspired by their French counterparts and take to the streets in a more concerted campaign of direct action? Will parties from the far right and far left benefit from the public belief that the centre is rotten (the imminent local and European elections will be an intriguing bellwether)? More questions than answers from me I’m afraid.

Meanwhile, how appealing is a career in politics today? MPs used to be among the most respected members of a community – not now. It was accepted that they worked to serve the public and lived by a political doctrine that was in fact a calling (okay, I know this was not a universal state of affairs, but I hope you take my point). Today, they are perceived to serve (and help) themselves.

Young people who are already unimpressed and uninterested in politics are becoming even more disengaged and dismissive. So far, the UK has not benefited from an Obama lightning rod, and our politicians appear to more disconnected from ‘real’ society than ever. I really worry about the future make up of Parliament in the UK, and if that institution is compromised further, the cascade to all levels of Government will inevitably happen and the effects could be disastrous.

But I am a glass half full person and I still know many good people for whom politics is a real vocation; people who hold genuine, fervent political beliefs and who strive for office for the ‘right’ reasons.

My eldest son’s godfather, Ed Fordham, is one of them, and he is not alone. There are many others from across the political spectrum and they give me hope. But their job is going to be significantly more difficult thanks to the greed and, in my opinion, stupidity of some of the current crop of MPs. And Ed is my age (late 30s), so what about the generation after him, and his colleagues and opponents of a similar vintage? Someone reassure me that they will emerge. Please. Here's Ed expressing his views on the expenses saga, 27 minutes and 28 seconds into this episode of Newsnight.

I am a layperson when it comes to politics, but that makes me no less passionate than the ‘professionals’ about what Aristotle described as the most authoritative science. According to Aristotle, politics governs the other sciences and their ends serve to meet its end, which is nothing less than the human good. Here in the UK at the moment, the science of politics feels a lot less dignified and worthy than that. I hope that will change for the better again soon.

http://twitter.com/chrisjlines

Heading for the hills...and the valleys, and the forests, and the water...

The UK outdoor industry has always been fairly resilient during an economic downturn. It’s not recession proof of course, but certain factors work in its favour. When people have to tighten their belts, they tend to eschew holidays abroad and instead spend leisure time closer to home (an Outdoor Industries Association survey from as recently as January established that 49% of the UK public is now more likely to consider an outdoor break in this country, rather than head overseas). The great outdoors offers a handy venue that is generally low cost, while camping and caravanning are also budget alternatives to hotels. Similarly, consumers tend to cut back on luxury fashion products but will continue to invest in practical, durable kit such as that designed for the outdoors.

In the current economic climate, there is even more happening that indicates that 2009 will turn out to be a strong year for the outdoor industry. For a start, from January to March the country experienced something close to a proper winter, which had an immediate positive impact on sales of products like waterproof jackets, insulation layers, and hats and gloves. Meanwhile, the Pound was at its weakest against the Dollar and Euro, so many people chose to stay in the UK to enjoy their winter outdoor adventures, keeping money in the country’s economy.

As we head towards the summer, the situation continues to favour the outdoor industry. In recent weeks, we have enjoyed bursts of warm, dry weather which has focused eyes on outdoor horizons. Campsites are enjoying a boom time and the Camping and Caravanning Club has reported a huge increase in advance bookings for sites across the country (27% up on the same time last year). As well as sunshine, there have also been cloudbursts, so the need to be properly equipped with waterproof kit has remained at the forefront of minds.

And now the Met Office has announced that we can expect a hot, dry summer. This is going to do no harm at all to business for campsites, outdoor activity providers and manufacturers of tents, warm weather performance outdoor products, and especially footwear. At the same time, the general interest in and appetite for outdoor activities has been on a steady upward curve for several years. This trend is not about to change and is actually being accelerated by numerous central and regional government initiatives designed to get people into the outdoors.

So, it makes absolute sense for different parts of the UK to promote the outdoors as a key part of their tourism offer. This week, North East England started its own campaign to do just that. The Outdoor and Active initiative has kicked off by encouraging the region’s public to move around the North East to try out the many outdoor activities that are available really close to home. Press Ahead arranged a day of fun for the bosses of three outdoor tourism businesses from different parts of the region. They tried out each other’s specialist activities and visited various locations, all in one busy day.

Amy Craggs from Beamish Wild Ropes Activity Centre, Simon White from Tees Active watersports and Andrew Straw from Saddle Skedaddle cycling tours were our three adventurers. They really got stuck into the task and I think they enjoyed their day – the photos certainly seem to indicate that they had a good time.

We’re looking forward to getting the North East into the outdoors over the next few months, but we have also been tasked with bringing visitors from elsewhere to the region. We have some phenomenal outdoor locations up here and they are generally really accessible. However, many of these are relatively unknown, so there’s a great opportunity to show off this wonderful part of the world to a huge audience that is absolutely ready to head for the outdoors and open to suggestions. We’ve got some exciting, and I think innovative, ideas up our technical wicking fabric sleeves, so expect to see and hear much more about Outdoor and Active in North East England soon.

Of course, the North East is not the only region or nation that is promoting its outdoor assets this year, which is even more good news for the outdoor industry in general. Taking all of the above into consideration, it is no wonder that brands like Berghaus remain relatively bullish about prospects for 2009. Although there is no complacency among firms and there are previously successful retailers and brands in the sector that are really struggling (or worse), this particular business landscape is in generally better health than many others at the moment.

In short, heading for the hills (and the rest) has never been more popular. As Richard Cotter, Berghaus brand president, stated recently:
“Over the next few years, outdoor participation will increase massively, not in its original sense, but in the widest context. More than ever, people want to find a route of escape from everyday life and outdoor activities offer that. They choose to do something active, but not just one activity. These days, the opportunity to try out a wide range of ‘adventure sports’ is massive and this is one of the fastest growing sectors in the whole leisure industry.

“Huge numbers of people are heading outdoors every weekend looking for their definition of adventure – camping, hiking, scrambling, biking, climbing and much more. Crucially, many of these people have never previously been aligned to the outdoor industry and only now do companies like Berghaus really have the chance to communicate with them."

Amen to that. Right, I’m off to find a map, a compass and plan an adventure or two of my own.

iROC Rocks in Weardale

Congratulations to Morgan Donnelly (right) and Nicola MacLeod who were the men’s and women’s overall winners of the inaugural iROC adventure race event last weekend. Morgan won the first race of the event on the Saturday morning and finished in the top three of each race he competed in. Similarly, Nicola achieved top three finishes in all of her races, so both achieved aggregate scores that put them ahead of their respective fields. The full results can be found on the iROC website.

The sun shone for iROC, which ran on the 18th and 19th April, and the race director Shane Ohly was delighted with feedback from competitors and spectators. Visitors from as far afield as Plymouth, Ireland, Holland and Germany attended, some turning up to take part in just one of the races.

The Lafarge site in the heart of Weardale was hailed as the perfect venue thanks to its spectacular views and challenging terrain. Entertainment on the Saturday night included local groups New Era, Christian and Georgia, Ashleigh Maddison, and Two Foot Maid. The evening was topped off by Rick Jackson, a one man Irish rock band.

So, all in all, iROC definitely seems to have been a success. I await news of future plans with much anticipation.

A new outdoor adventure races North East

After the slightly unfulfilling 'outdoor' experience of the Outdoors Show a few weeks ago (see blog post from 28 March), I was delighted to be on hand to witness the start of a proper grass roots event on Saturday. iROC introduced a new concept in adventure racing and made its debut over the weekend in the beautiful surroundings of the Durham Dales.

iROC, sponsored by Weardale based outdoor brand inov-8, used a new format that combined a series of different races across three different disciplines that included fell running, mountain biking and orienteering. On Saturday and Sunday, there were six individual races, with varying periods of down-time (hours or minutes) between each. The close succession of these six races made iROC a true adventure racing weekend and the different skill sets required to complete the various disciplines meant that only a true all-rounder could become outright winner. The organisers also staged races for novices and families, so iROC offered something for all kinds of outdoor enthusiasts.

iROC marked the start of a summer in the North East that will be packed with outdoor events and initiatives. North East tourism organisations have put the theme of ‘Outdoor and Active’ at the heart of their plans for 2009 and attractions across the region will be playing their part in a sustained push to encourage the public to explore the great outdoors that surrounds them. Press Ahead has been hired to promote Outdoor and Active, so look out for much more on this during the next few months.

iROC certainly got the region's outdoor programme of activity off to an energetic start and was based in an ideal location, at the heart of the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Upper Weardale and the Durham Dales in general deserve the well worn phrase 'hidden gems'. That neck of the woods is a wonderful part of the world - lovely villages, a gorgeous landscape and not too many people. Don't get me wrong - I'm no misanthrope, but it's sometimes a real pleasure to go for a walk in the hills without bumping into anyone else (or at least very few others). You can do that in Upper Weardale and part of our job this summer is to encourage more people to try the experience. Success in the latter might seem to make the former less likely, but in truth there is loads of empty space up there.

I took my two sons along to see the start of iROC on Saturday. The first race of the weekend was a 13km fell run, which was well contested by a strong field. Watching the runners as they made their way along the horizon, we were amused to spot a herd of cows who took an interest and started to criss cross the hillside, following the runners back and forth. I think they provided as much of a natural obstacle as the steep climb, rapid descent and the river.

The winner of the first race was Morgan Donnelly (right) and afterwards, the organisers were getting plenty of positive feedback about the course. I'll update this post with more results when I have them. I had to leave after that race, but based on what I witnessed, I think that iROC will be judged a big success and I hope that it becomes a regular date on the outdoor calendar - I may even have a go at one or two of the races myself next time.

The lost art of communication?

On the curve

I read an article in the Newcastle Journal last week that made we wonder where I am on ‘the curve’. This article reported a presentation in which a digital media ‘expert’ called Joanne Jacobs claimed that bloggers are ‘old and finished’. Great – I only started mine recently and already I’m at the wrong end of the curve, or worse, behind it. That’s if Joanne Jacobs knows her onions of course. The report in which she was quoted came from a conference held at The Sage Gateshead called re:boot re:place. According to the Journal, Joanne went on to say that, because bloggers are finished, ‘people are moving towards Twitter’. Well now, I tweet too, so perhaps that puts me back into a better position on the curve.

You know what, I shouldn’t worry about this too much. I have never been desperately concerned about how ‘on trend’ I am – anyone who has witnessed my choice of hairstyle (and I use the second syllable here cautiously), music and ties over the years will understand that. The choices I make about my use of digital media are based on whether a) I can understand and engage with the platforms myself, b) I think that they can add something of value to the communications mix for my business and the businesses of my clients and, c) I have something of interest to communicate through them. Reading this, you may judge that I have mis-calculated on that last point. But I hope not.

This all brings me neatly to Twitter. Fad, phenomenon, irritant, viral nirvana. All of these and the rest. I use Twitter a lot and I believe that it has real relevance now to my trade, but I’m not obsessing and I aim to always use it responsibly and in a communal way. There is an ethos of sharing that is integral to Twitter, allowing information and insight to pass quickly to many people – I hope that fundamental principal remains a constant and it is what I mean when I refer to responsible use. Someone from the world of PR who has consistently been ahead of the curve when it comes to social media is Ste Davies, founder of 3W PR.

Ste recently spoke about the relationship between Twitter and PR at a conference and then kindly shared his thoughts with the rest of us via Twitter. The presentation, Twitter and Public Relations, is still online on Ste's own blog site. It’s definitely worth a read and, along with a lot of sage practical advice, includes a few great ‘car crash’ examples of people using Twitter without due care and attention – slides 44-46 had me wincing instinctively.

I have embraced several forms of social media and will continue to use them extensively. However, there is a big part of me that is a traditionalist and I worry about the impact that these new forms of communication are having on society and in particular the written word. Suddenly, the point that someone wants to make has to be synthesised and distilled into a mere 140 characters in order to be communicated to the world. Incidentally, that last sentence came to 151 characters, so is too long to qualify as a tweet.

I enjoy reading well structured, cleverly composed copy that uses imaginative language, multiple clauses and ‘sparkles’. Even more, I love creating lively prose myself – writing is one of the real pleasures of my job (whether it is a pleasure to read or not!). But Twitter simply doesn’t allow for such elaboration and other social networks certainly don’t encourage it. This approach to communications will become habit and aspects of it will (and already do) infect the written word elsewhere.

Younger (though not exclusively) generations already text rather than email (as opposed to email rather than write a letter). And it's not just written communications that are affected by this developing trend. Use of the spoken word is changing too and a new programme on BBC2 called The Lost Art of Oratory explores this theme. The Beeb has also just launched a search for the UK's best young speaker - that could be interesting.

In the final analysis, I fear that we are losing a lot by gaining Twitter, Facebook and their like. While I accept a degree of the inevitability of that, it is also one of the reasons that I will continue to blog. I can express myself at will and at length – if you decide that what I produce is tedious, then you don’t have to read any more. Meanwhile, I’m already planning future blogs on the state of the media and The State of Play, and what makes a good song (in my humble opinion). I really don’t care where that puts me curve-wise and I certainly don’t feel finished, or too old.