JLS switch on Trafford Centre Lights

What a fantastic night that was!

We’re still coming down from the ceiling, after last night’s Christmas Lights Switch on with JLS.

ON: The moment JLS switch on the lights.

It was definitely the biggest event we’ve ever held at The Trafford Centre, and I’ve spoken to so many people who said they had the time of their lives.

I was in charge of media and celebrities, so I have some great images of myself with Stavros Flately, Fe-Nix, Chris Fountain and even Gary Wilmott!

The press were blown away by how popular the event was, and I have to say once the lights went on I have never seen the Centre look so magical.

We did have some traffic issues, mainly because of two accidents that occured off site which blocked the roads. At one point, these jams even blocked our star act JLS – but luckily they managed to make it through on time, and stunned the Orient with a breath-taking version of Umbrella, plus their new single Everybody In Love.

The JLS fans were out in force – the hardcore JLS forum members all seemed to have “JLS” written on their faces, so they were easy to spot.

At one point I stood with my cameraman on the ship and waved at 7,000 people – and 7,000 people waved back. What a crazy feeling!

If you made it to the show, let me know what you thought of the acts. Send me your pictures too!

Freefall thrills at The Trafford Centre

Oh, are we excited over this one!

Construction has begun on the newest jewel in the Trafford Quays Leisure Village crown, and that’s the incredible Airkix attraction that’s taking shape next to the indoor ski centre ChillFactore.

DARING: TV's Bear Grylls enjoys an Airkix moment.

Airkix is an indoor skydiving experience, which uses enormous air-fans to suspend flyers above the ground, and give them the sensation of freefall – but without the need for an expensive airplane! The attraction is set to open in 2010, and we suspect it might just cause a stir amongst the daredevils of the region.

There’s a short list of things that can stop you from flying – for example, if you weigh more than 18stone, or are wearing a hard cast.

But for the most part almost anyone can have a go, and the Airkix people are also very experienced in helping those people living with disabilities to experience the joy of flight.

I remember seeing these things on TV years ago, but I would never have believed they would be created especially for public use. Celebrities have been queuing up to fly, including ace adventurer Bear Grylls (pictured) – and I can imagine a few Corrie stars taking the leap when the fans start spinning next year.

I hear on the grapevine that a large percentage of people who visit the first Airkix in Milton Keynes are real-life sky-divers, who use the facility for flying practice because it is so close to the real thing. How cool is that?

Watch this space for more news on Airkix as it happens, get your helmets ready for the ride of your life!

WILL you be taking a flight on Airkix? Tell me about it!

Trafford Centre wins Group Leisure award

AWARD: (l-r) TV's Tina Hobley, TTC's Caroline Hall, The Mall Rat, and award presenter Anna Warrilow, from sponsors West Midland Safari Park.

I had a lovely evening in Birmingham recently, as The Trafford Centre picked up another award for our work on groups visiting the Centre from all over the UK.

We were at the Hilton Metropole near the NEC, taking part in a sparkling ceremony that bigs up the best destinations in the UK for coach parties.

Coach travel is big business in Britain, as more and more tourists opt for one-day, or short-stay vacations to explore the hot-spots.

We welcome hundreds of coaches throughout the year, and we try to ensure that we give each coach the same kind of personal service you can expect if you visit us on your own, or with family. These efforts were rewarded last week, when we won the award for Best Shopping Venue in the UK, from the readers of Group Leisure magazine.

It’s the second time in two years we’ve won the award, and that’s a tribute to all the hard work our staff do in welcoming huge groups to a safe and fun stay at the Centre. Because this award was voted for by readers, it’s extra special to us, and The Trafford Centre marketing team and I were only to eager to go and bask in the glory, and meet a few industry leaders along the way.

So a huge hello to everyone we met that night, including TV actress Tina Hobley who presented our award, and the folks from Charity on Wheels, who will be bringing a coach-load of people to see us in a few weeks time for a mega-shopping trip!

I was also bowled over by the amazing staff from Group Leisure magazine, who were so excited at this, their biggest event of the year. Their enthusiasm for the group travel market was so obvious, and I soon found myself looking at brochures for coach trips to the Highlands.

Now that’s marketing!

HAVE you visited The Trafford Centre as a coach party? What did you think?

Kro Bar set to open at The Trafford Centre

THE builders are busy this week, preparing for the grand opening of the new Kro Bar, in The Great Hall.

If you are a local, you can’t help but have noticed this award-winning Danish dining and drinking experience, as it already has high-profile branches in the city centre.

We knew it wouldn’t be long before their bold, contemporary and stylish bars were headed our way to The Trafford Centre – and lo and behold, they have taken the last empty space in The Great Hall, behind The Orient. This luxury dining space has really put itself on the gastronomic map, with it’s Carluccio’s Italian spot, and the incredibly popular Las Iguanas.

CHIC: The Piccadilly Kro Bar.

The newcomer will create 60 jobs here at the Centre – so if you fancy your hand as a Kro member of staff, why not pop down to our Jobcentre near the bus station for an application pack?

Diners can expect a delicious range of Danish-inspired foods, and the great draught and bottled beers for which the brand has become famous, all in a super-chic atmosphere. The other Kro bars I know also stock newspapers, so I hope that’s something the new place adopts too.

The property team here at the Centre are over the moon to have secured this new deal, especially as Kro is truly a local firm, and really fills out The Great Hall with a funky new offering.

The venue is set to open next month, and your Mall Rat will be one of the first over the threshold to sample their Nordic wares!

LOVE Kro? Tell me about it!

Birthday balloon for The Trafford Centre?

I got the shock of my life when I arrived for work this morning, to see this enormous red hot air balloon floating outside our offices at The Trafford Centre!

GIANT: The Redrow balloon

It’s our 11^th birthday today, so my first thought was:  Someone’s got us a birthday balloon!

 Of course, I had been warned that the homes specialists Redrow were bringing a hot air balloon – but I’ve never seen one up close, and had no idea they were so large!

I met some customers out in the car park at lunch, who told me excitedly that they’d just been up in the balloon.

 ‘Did you get a good view of the Centre?’ I asked.

 “Nah!” they sniffed – “We only went up about eight feet!”

 Health and safety clearly applies as much in the air as it does on the ground…

 The eye-catching behemoth will be promoting first-time buys and part-exchange deals on homes for the rest of the day – so if you fancy a go in a hot air balloon (just not very high!) then get yourself down to car park Regent 13 now!

George Sampson the YouTube King

George Sampson, champion dancer

I’ve just been looking at our YouTube Channel, and trying to work out which of our videos is the most popular (the things you have to do for a board report!).

For ages, the lead video was the massive Ricky Hatton promo we held in The Orient – and thanks to a little widget in YouTube, we were able to tell that most of the many thousands of people who watched that vid were from the Philipines, and were Manny fans, rather than local people logging on to see their Mancunian hero! Just goes to show, you never can tell.

But what’s this, as I peruse the figures for last month’s YouTube audience  – the biggest hit at the moment is clearly George Sampson’s Christmas Message. Now, for those out of towners who might not know, George Sampson was the winner of Britain’s Got Talent, when he was a local schoolboy from Warrington who danced for pennies on Market Street before finding fame. He turned on our Christmas lights last year. (I looked after him for part of the day and he’s a lovely lad, but he never sits still.)

Far be it from me to wonder why people want to watch a Christmas message in the middle of summer, but they certainly do – more than 7000 views, and peaking.

In case you are wondering, that’s his sister with him in the video, who danced with him on stage here at TTC, and was like a mini-George.

I know this hyper-active dancer has film projects in the pipeline, and we loved his debut single when he showcased it here at The Trafford Centre, so I can only imagine that with the loyal fanbase he clearly has, that anything this talented local lad touches will turn to gold.

Trafford pair hit the airwaves

If you were listening to Radio Wave on the Fylde coast last weekend, you might have heard a reference to The Trafford Centre Girls, taking part in the 5k Race for Life.

BRAVE: Ann, left, and Sue do us proud.

My two brave colleagues Ann Sullivan and Sue Mullally ran through wind and heavy rain in an amazing time of 45 minutes, raising more than £500 for vital cancer research along the way!

I’m told that Ann in particular ran the course ‘like a whippet’ – which is no surprise, as our limber receptionist is well used to exercise thanks to her dancing regime in various amateur dramatics productions. The local Blackpool radio station spotted the pair clad in Trafford Centre red, and pointed them out to the audience at every lap.

It seems even being associated with The Trafford Centre is a short-cut to fame – and in this case, a very welcome fortune.

Well done girls!

Snow joke at The Trafford Centre

Well, we can’t say we’ve suffered as much as other areas of the country this week with the great swathes of snow which have come sleeting in from the Antarctic Circle (I imagine.) (See BBC News)

 It’s been many years since since large amounts of snow fell on Britain, and many schools and councils have been caught short in preparation. We face issues of salt shortages just like everywhere else in the UK, with mile after mile of road around The Trafford Centre site requiring gritting during weather like this – tonnes of the white stuff getting thrown down every day,  it’s a mammoth task. Luckily, it’s worked for us so far and we’ve had zero traffic issues over the snowy days.

On a lighter note, my colleague Paul went a walking around the site yesterday, so I asked him to take his camera and snap a few pictures of the Centre in the snow. I might turn them into next year’s Trafford Centre Christmas card!

Snow at Wildespool Wood

Fir trees by The Orient

View from our management suite

An icy pond at Wildespool (no ducks)

Just needs some baubles and lights!

Icy Barton Square from the campanile

Snow around the ski slopes - with much more inside!

The Trafford Centre goes multicoloured

WE’VE been enjoying a new look of our own at The Trafford Centre this week, as the long-awaited changes to the lighting system in the Main Dome were finally switched on.

Engineers have replaced the old sodium lighting with sparkly new LED lights, controlled by a central computer. Much like your blog page options, the digital RGB system means we can now make the lights any colour we want! The new wardrobe looks incredible – I was at a friend’s flat near to the Centre last night, and the clear cold Manchester evening was lit up by the red dome in the distance.

This is the Dome in it’s usual blue – like the other two domes on the boulevards of The Trafford Centre, it’s been shining in this rather arresting blue for more than ten years. The colour has become a signature of the kind of outre architecture of the Centre.

 

 

 

Then for Comic Relief’s Red Nose Day last weekend, we turned the colour of the Dome to red, and for the first time the profile of the Centre (which is seen by literally millions of eyes in the course of a month, as the cars fly by on the nearby M60 motorway) changed completely.

 

 

And on St Patrick’s Day on Tuesday, we turned the Dome green – to match the traditional colour of the festival of the Emerald Isle. (I have to say, the Green Dome is my favourite so far, it looks proper space age!)

Take a gander at the other colours we’ve tried out so far in my Dome gallery, and if you want to read more about it, read this newspaper article.

Before you ask, the scheme cost about £40,000 to create – but in the long run it will save us money, as the new lights are much more environmentally-friendly. They only use a fraction of the power of the old lights, and have to be replaced once every ten years or so – rather than once a year like the old system. So we’re saving on those leccy bills, and helping the planet look better, for longer.

Who says being Green can’t be stylish!!?

From Mall Rat to Canal rat

I was lucky enough to be given a guided tour of the new MediaCity that’s currently springing up at Salford Quays – and what a massive project it’s turning out to be!

Hundreds of doozers are crammed onto the various building sites around the place, as they construct studio facilities, shops, and residential towers in preparation for the arrival of various BBC departments.

HUGE: Media City UK

The owners of The Trafford Centre also own the land over at the Quays, and my colleagues there have been busy for months arranging one of the biggest emigrations of BBC staff the organisation has ever seen. I was particularly impressed with the idea of ‘waxies’ – or ‘water taxis’ that will ferry people along the canal from the city centre, and out to the Quays.

That same canal reaches right up to The Trafford Centre – which leaves me with the tempting idea of grabbing a boat after work to get to one of our team building nights out in town. Life jacket anyone?

If you haven’t seen the works at MediaCity recently, do take a look. The bricks are stacking up with at a great rate of knots, and in three months time it will no doubt look completely different to how it appears today.

You can read more about the plans on the Media City UK website, or follow progress via the Manchester Evening News.

You can’t, however, book a waxie.

Yet.

Denim and Diamonds are forever at TTC

Well, we’re all fashioned-out this week after the fantastic success of this year’s VIP Fashion Show, which took place on a catwalk in The Orient area of The Trafford Centre.

DANCER: Dressed by Clavin Klein Jeans.

 

The “Denim and Diamonds” event aimed to raise much needed cash for our chosen charity The New Children’s Hospital Appeal – as well as inspiring fashionistas from all over the North to indulge in a little of the denim and sparkles trend that has swept the High Street.

I designed a ‘Diamond’ cocktail for the event – and we even had some dinky little drinks stirrers made with our Denim and Diamonds logo printed on – many of which went missing as people took them for souvenirs of their evening!

There was also music and dance on offer, including some breath-taking urban dance moves from The Dance Art Productions crew.

You can see their nimble footwork on the new video that’s currently top of our playlist on our YouTube channel. The dancers modelled, and the models danced, and it all made for a dramatic and very exciting show. I went back-stage afterwards to pass on my congratulations to our choreographer Cheryl – but the place was so hectic with models and clothes that I didn’t stay too long.

 

Hundreds of people were seated in the VIP seats, the media descended too – and then hundreds more stood on the balconies over-looking the catwalk near The Big Screen. If you missed the show, or the Autumn Winter Fashion Shows which followed at the weekend, catch up on all the looks in our online galleries. And let me know what you think of the dancers. We loved them!

While I’m talking about fashion, I wanted to introduce you to our latest ebook, which showcases looks for the Autumn Winter season. You can read it online here, and even watch style advice videos embedded into the pages.

What will we think of next?

 

 

 

 

VIP fashion show almost here!

WE’VE been having great fun here in the marketing department, getting everything ready for our VIP Denim and Diamonds fashion show next week.

Thursday 10th September

I sourced a fantastic cocktail recipe for our guests, a Diamond Champagne cocktail that contains a sugar cube and Angustora Bitters in the bottom of the flute, which should create a bit of sparkle. Eight hundred of those will certainly keep our catering staff busy for the evening!

We’ve even had hundreds of Denim and Diamonds souvenir swizzle sticks printed, so each customer has a little something to remind them of the evening.

The Denim and Diamonds theme aims to show how grit can meet glamour, as workaday denim is married to high-class crystal adornment. It’s the latest look, and absolutely anyone can pull it off. Even the gents (you should see my sparkly cuff links!)

We also had a nice idea to give away a real diamond on the night, so one lucky person is going to walk away with a chunk of ‘ice’, courtesy of the generous folk at Goldsmith’s the jewellers.

And today, while we were walking around The Great Hall working out where to put beauty stands and cocktail tables, we’ve had some great ideas on how to dress the space with denim. You’ll have to come along to see how we do this – but along with the Diamond dancers we’ve organised, nobody should be in any doubt as to the theme of the show!

This is one of the highlights of the calendar at The Trafford Centre, and the staff here tend to get very excited at the prospect of hundreds of glamorous people descending to watch a breath-taking show. I’ll be sitting near the front with the lovely fashion writers from the local media – look for the fella in denim and diamonds!

The brilliant Chelsea Norris from Key 103 will be hosting the Main Stage, and she’ll be introducing collections from stores like Vivienne Westwood, DKNY and Calvin Klein. We’ve also booked the Red Hot Strings for a bit of entertainment, because they were so good at our 10th Birthday party last year.

If you fancy coming, we still have a few tickets left – just click here for details. Just be quick, as uptake this year has been phenomenal.

If you can’t make it (and why on earth not?) we’ll be revealing how everything went on our YouTube channel after the show.

Denim and Diamonds at The Trafford Centre

We’ve been crashingly creative this week, coming up with ideas and themes for our Autumn Winter Fashion Show in September.

Basically, the brief is to support the changing of the seasons with a big push on men’s and women’s fashion. To do this, we hold a fashion week every year, which gets people excited about the new trends, and gives a bit of inspiration for those who might be a bit overwhelmed by the high street!

AW09 at TTC

One highlight of the week is the VIP Fashion Show, a charity night that showcases all the amazing designer talent we have on offer here at The Trafford Centre. This year, we’ve gone for the theme of “Denim and Diamonds” – which is meant to highlight the clever way in which everyday fashion (Denim) can be enlivened with a bit of bling (Diamonds).

It’s one way of saying you don’t have to wear an entire designer outfit. You have much more impact (and save much more money) if you mix and match your staples with a gobsmacking signature piece that turns heads!

We’ve found a fabulous diamond cocktail to serve our guests, and we are hoping to have a ‘diamond-strewn’ carpet at the grand entrance! We’ve also asked our fave strings duo The Red Hot Strings to come back and play during the interval.

(As hosts, we are also looking for denim and diamond themed outfits, so if you have any ideas on that front please let me know. Denim suits have a bad history, as well you know!)

If you’d like to come to the event, tickets are only a tenner, with £5 going to the New Children’s Hospital Appeal. You can order yours by clicking on our website.

Where else in Manchester could you have the best of the designer names paraded in front of you, as you sit relaxing by the catwalk? If you fancy an injection of glamour and ease, do youself a favour and be a VIP.