Place-Branding and Product-Branding in a peripheral economy: the case of Wales

Abstract

In this paper we explore issues around the increasing importance of symbolic value and how these might feed into the concept of regional branding, using Wales as the context. In order to do this we firstly provide a brief review of Welsh cultural and political history, followed by a discussion of the literature on place-branding itself. We then present a range of examples, quotes and imagery from Welsh companies and from the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) in relation to their recent branding (and re-branding) activities. The hypothesis we seek to develop is of a coevolving regional product and regional image branding landscape, in which aspects of regional culture are manipulated, reinvented and in turn fed back between the private and public sectors, is the key theme that we develop here. At present the change described above only involves a relatively small number of companies, but significant in terms of profile, who are consciously stepping away from the past, more ‘conservative’ images, symbolism and cultural references to become more successful- and in turn these firms are themselves impacting upon and framing the cultural shift, raising the scope for the use of more self-confident, humorous, and self-deprecating symbols and manifestations of regional identity.