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Place Branding Nantes

 Place Branding starts with inquiry 

Reading the conference paper of António Azevedo (Azevedo 2009) I realise from his methods that I need to ask people who live in Nantes, why they love or hate their city.  This is technically, the first step in a Place Branding exercise.  Place Branding starts with an inquiry into what the city already represents for its inhabitants.  I need to discover, 'What is Nantes?'  Only, then can I begin to unpick the components of what has value.  But how do I determine what has value for a respondent to my research question? André Breton declares in his surrealist novel, Nadja (1928), that Nantes is (quoted in Garrett 2010, 193) 'perhaps, with Paris, the only town in France where I had the impression that something worthwhile could happen to me.'  Martin Garrett explains that André Breton was sent to Nantes in July 1915, to work as a medical auxiliary at 2 rue du Bocage (Garrett 2010, 193); that is almost exactly 100 years ago.




Close-reading of André Breton

There are three key turns of phrase in Breton's statement, 'had the impression', 'something worthwhile' and 'could happen to me'. These positions need to be distilled into a question or prompt to locals, and possibly, later to visitors to Nantes.  

« Nantes : peut-être avec Paris la seule ville de France où j'ai l'impression que peut m'arriver quelque chose qui en vaut la peine, où certains regards brûlent pour eux-mêmes de trop de feux (je l'ai constaté encore l'année dernière, le temps de traverser Nantes en automobile et de voir cette femme, une ouvrière, je crois, qu'accompagnait un homme, et qui a levé les yeux : j'aurais dû m'arrêter), où pour moi la cadence de la vie n'est pas la même qu'ailleurs, où un esprit d'aventure au-delà de toutes les aventures habite encore certains êtres, Nantes, d'où peuvent encore me venir des amis, Nantes où j'ai aimé un parc : le parc de Procé. »

 




References

Azevedo, A. (2009) 'Are you proud to live here? A residents oriented place marketing audit (attachment, self-esteem and identity)' Minho University, Braga, Portugal.

Breton, A., (1928) Nadja, Paris: NRF.

Garrett, M. (2010) The Loire: A Cultural History, Oxford: OUP.

Freire, J. (2009) 'Local People a critical dimension for place brands' Journal of Brand Management 16, 420-438. 





 

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