AS A self-confessed shopaholic, you could say Emily Palmer has landed her dream job.

Surrounded by more than 200 big name stores offering everything from high fashion to personalised gifts, Emily has been appointed as Festival Place’s new marketing manager.

It is a role Emily is relishing – but for much more than just the shopping heaven.

With a background in events, she is at the forefront of Festival Place’s evolution from a shopping centre to a more diversified regional destination, offering a mix of shopping, dining, leisure and community events.

“Retail is evolving and Festival Place is very much leading the way in terms of offering more to people than purely a shopping experience,” says Emily, who previously worked in marketing a clutch of smaller shopping centres.

“Now it is basically a day out for many families. Retail hubs are increasingly needing to match customers’ expectations with a more varied and interesting food and leisure offer.”

Festival Place has already made significant in-roads into enhancing its offer. Since its acquisition by AEW Europe in 2015, footfall has increased by more than two million visits per year to 22.4 million in 2017.

It now boasts more than 20 eateries, a state-of-the-art 10-screen Vue multiplex cinema, a fitness, leisure and sports complex spread over seven floors, Flip Out trampoline park, and a community library. The car park is currently undergoing a major renovation to ensure it is more family-friendly and the customer lounge is a one-stop shop for a host of services, such as dry cleaning and CollectPlus.

This year Festival Place’s calendar is action-packed with events – from a Lego safari for families, to catwalk fashion shows, to food festivals.

Emily, whose university dissertation focused on the positive impact of events on retail footfall, said: “I wanted to come and work for Festival Place because it was exciting to see the brand go in a new direction.

“We have a big community recycling initiative coming up this summer that I have been leading on. It’s basically putting the fun into recycling and builds on Festival Place’s strong sustainability record, so that’s one event I’m particularly looking forward to.”

Yet marketing Festival Place is not without its own unique challenges, adds Emily.

“There are still perceptions of what the centre used to be and it’s about reaching out to those people who might not have visited Festival Place in a few years. No two days are the same here because we have so many brands on one single site. But the variety and pressure are something I enjoy.”

Emily is currently working with local stakeholders, the council and Basingstoke community groups to help spread the message about the vibrancy of Basingstoke to the wider region.

Emily, who is an avid gym goer and trains just a stone’s throw from her office at Basingstoke Sports Centre, adds: “Basingstoke is on the up – it’s benefitting from the London effect, with a lot of companies choosing to locate here. The knock-on effect of that is a large pool of talented business people and innovators here, so that can only be a good thing moving forward. Basingstoke is very much carving out its own identity and it’s exciting to be part of that.”