HIC Talk

Alison Griffin continues her look at the economic impact of events…

HIC is one of Harrogate’s biggest economic drivers, impacting on everything from tourism and event providers to local shops and infrastructure. One of the benefits of being an international event venue located in a town rather than a huge city is that we don’t work in isolation. HIC functions as part of the community. At every step we promote Harrogate and the surrounding area as a destination alongside the venue. People don’t just come to Harrogate for the venue – there is far more here on offer and we continually try to present a cohesive and developed offering to potential clients.

To further increase our economic impact HIC has invested heavily in improving the venue’s facilities. A £13 million expansion project to construct new Halls G and H will increase our capacity by 20%. This ensures we remain competitive and will allow us to run multiple events simultaneously. The project will not only benefits event organisers and visitors but the whole region. Investment in HIC will raise the region’s profile as a place to do business and help bring long term prosperity and growth to the Centre. Consequently local people and business will be directly affected by its economic impact.

There are hundreds of venues around the UK, clearly most are smaller with far fewer events than HIC but each one still brings something to the economy, injecting vitally needed funds at a time when dramatic cuts are being made in a whole range of sectors. And these figures truly highlight the importance of events to our economy.