Culture Liverpool Major Events Evaluations

Since being awarded European Capital of Culture in 2008, Liverpool has continued to take centre stage through its award-winning cultural programme and shown the world just what the city is capable of. Since 2008, the city has continued to build on its world class reputation, using culture as a driving force for the regeneration of the whole city. Its events attract hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city, building Liverpool as a destination and driving millions into the economy.

Further to this, Culture has been at the heart of the city’s economic recovery post pandemic and 2022 saw the city continue to build on this through staging a variety of ambitious, world class events throughout the year. M·E·L Research were appointed to carry out Visitor Satisfaction, Social & Economic Impact Studies on four major events throughout 2022.

This research monitored the impact of the major events programme to ensure that they can continue to be improved and developed in future years and actively contribute towards the city’s wider business plan. The study also included an analysis of the economic impact of the events on the city, using the eventIMPACTS framework.

The four events under evaluation were Taste Liverpool. Drink Bordeaux in June 2022, Liverpool International Music Festival in July 2022, River of Light in October-November 2022, and the World Gymnastics Championships in October-November 2022. In addition to conducting the Visitor Satisfaction and Social and Economic Impact studies for the World Gymnastics Championships, M·E·L Research were also commissioned to conduct a pre-event survey with ticket bookers to understand what they were hoping to get out of the event, and also wrote a report summarising the performance of the Championships in relation to its KPIs, incorporating data from the visitor survey, athlete and volunteers survey, expenditure reports and media reports, among other sources.

Approach

For each event, a face to face to face survey was conducted with visitors during the course of the event. The survey was conducted using a systematic sampling approach, with a refusal survey a minute in length offered to those who were unable to take the full survey. This allowed us to understand the profile of all event attendees, in order to weight the data of those who took the full survey. An online survey was also run for each event, being mailed to ticket-bookers for Taste Liverpool. Drink Bordeaux, World Gymnastics Championships and Liverpool International Music Festival. For River of Light the survey was shared on social media. The results of the online surveys were also weighted to the profile of the face to face interviews, where required due to differences in the profiles across the two surveys.

The survey investigated the demographic profile of attendees and where they were visiting from, and their visit type (i.e., whether the event was the primary reason for their visit to Liverpool, whether they were staying overnight or just for the day). It also measured perceptions of various aspects of the event, and the relative importance of each aspect, in order to help the event organisers to prioritise improvements going forwards. The survey also asked about experiences of travel to the event, and the amount that they had spent in the course of their visit, in order to calculate the overall impact that the event had on the local economy.

Outcomes

M·E·L Research provided a report on each individual event as well as a summary report overviewing the key results across all events. The survey results established the economic impact each event had on the local economy, as well as the areas with when visitors were most satisfied and least satisfied, to inform development of future events. As well as providing insight into satisfaction, the reports also identified the aspect of each event that are most important to audiences, in order to help event organisers identify the areas that should be prioritised for improvements. The reports also provided insights into the messaging channels that audiences had found out about the events on, and the other attractions in Liverpool that they had visited in the course of the event. The data on the economic impact that the events had upon the city have were published, for example: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-66098888

“M·E·L Research delivered Culture Liverpool’s economic research for the city’s major events programme in 2022. Findings from the research have helped to underpin the value culture has in the city and have informed some major decisions for the Culture Liverpool events programme moving forwards. 2022 saw the first iteration of the Taste Liverpool, Drink Bordeaux festival in the city and findings from the research have helped to sustain continued private sector support by highlighting the value of the event to the city’s hospitality sector and in turn has ensured the festival can be delivered again in 2023. Similarly, the findings of the research for River of Light evidenced the increasing impact the event is having on the city’s visitor economy sector and it’s wider tourism offer and has ensured the event is able to return again in 2023.”