Our survey said...

Should we be worried about a survey that says Nottingham is slipping down the rankings of the best cities for business?
Yes, in the sense that anything that suggests we’re not doing as well as we could do points to the need for improvement.
No, in the sense that at least a couple of the survey’s findings will seem distinctly flakey to people with detailed knowledge of Nottingham.
The UK Cities Monitor 2008, produced by property consultants Cushman Wakefield, is based on questions put to directors/managers in a selection of the UK’s top 200 companies about 15 UK cities.
Broadly speaking, the ranking suggests that Nottingham is about two-thirds of the way down the tables and slipping.
Without going into the gory detail, I suspect one of the reasons why it has slipped is that people don’t know enough about it. It gets an average-to-poor rating simply because that is the extent of the knowledge among those questioned.
This may well explain why, in two areas where Nottingham is widely acknowledged to be very strong, the Cushman Wakefield survey still manages to rank it poorly.
For retailing and leisure amenities, the UK Cities Monitor says it is 14th out of 15. Yet we know it is the sixth biggest shopping city in the country, one which the exalted Harvey Nichols is considering opening a store in.
Similarly, we’re 13th out of 15 for transport links in the city – even though our tram system and Big Wheel integrated transport network have been held up nationally and internationally as shining examples of good practice.
Looked at on their own, those particular rankings clearly don’t make sense. Like I say, they point to a bigger picture which suggests key people in major businesses don’t know Nottingham well enough.
Indeed, the most interesting table of all in the UK Cities Monitor is one which suggests Nottingham is one of the cities seen to be doing least to promote itself.
This is not the first time that the city has been accused of being backwards at coming forwards.
But even if it did come forwards, would more businesses actually come here? All sorts of factors go into a decision about where to base a business, with closeness to customers far and away the most important consideration.
This is why so much of UK business is biased towards the South East – it’s nearer the financial powerhouse of London, and nearer continental Europe, which remains our biggest trading partner.
But does physical closeness matter anymore? In an age when the internet was meant to bring the death of distance it may be that the best investment Nottingham could make is not just in better marketing but in the technological infrastructure of the buildings businesses might move into.
That could be the difference between being best–known and simply being the best.