BID3, Year 3: What has been achieved in Northfield Town Centre for Year 3 of the BID’s third term?
Northfield BID has been committed to helping create a solid and supportive network for the local Northfield BID business community. By improving the way business is done here, we aim to make Northfield a great place to shop, eat, work, and do business.We can provide this help only by working with partners like Birmingham City Council (which helps with waste management, community safety, highways, and planning), West Midlands Police (local police teams), and charities like Trident Reach and CGL, which support people recovering from addiction.
A Difficult Year - Cost Savings & Difficult Decisions by the BID Board
This year, the BID Company has had to save money because we expected to collect less income from the BID levy and other commercial income during 2024/25. After several meetings, the BID Board made these decisions:
The Town Centre Manager now works 4 days a week.
The Operations Officer and Caretaking Services now operates 16 hours a week.
There will only be one Christmas tree on Tays Corner.
The BID newsletter will be published as a double-sided sheet at least twice a year as we move to online publications.
The BID has moved to a smaller and cheaper space of operation.
Using hardier plants for seasonal decorations.
The BID Board hopes that by the end of the year, the BID will be in a better financial position and will be able to provide the services and projects you supported when you voted in November 2021.
What Have We Done?
In our BID3 Business Plan, we focus on four main areas: Improving, Protecting, Promoting, and Supporting Northfield. Here’s a summary of what we accomplished in 2024:
Improving Northfield – Improving the visual and physical appearance of Northfield Town Centre
Singletons Nurseries was contracted to provide summer and winter planting for the 46-floor planters.
The BID Caretaker Service, operated by the BID Operations Support Officer (Tony Adams), has provided free, on-demand services –
o 42 graffiti/tags were removed from retail/hospitality and service businesses, including lamp posts, benches, and litter bins.
o 31 Fly-tipping matters dealt with the council and private land owners or tenants.
o 61 Litter-picked bags filled on private land.
o 33 Referrals made to other partner agencies.
Year 3 of the five-year contract with “Festive Lighting” for 57 lamp post motifs and sparking Christmas tree lights and one Christmas tree for the Tays Corner site.
Annual deep clean of Northfield “High Street”, including the grot spots. This included the removal of gum from the tarmac.
Protecting Northfield – working with partners to provide a safe and secure Northfield Town Centre
The High Street Security Service (Simon Carr Security Services from January to August 2024 and Sabre Commercial Protection from September 2024) has been patrolling on foot. They have walked at least 9,300 miles of the BID area this year. Their role is to help businesses with issues like shoplifting and street begging and to assist and report to West Midlands Police and Birmingham City Council’s Community Safety Team to help build a case against those who chose to cause anti-social behaviour, alcohol, and drug misuse in Northfield Town Centre.
We worked with several partners in the Northfield, Selly Oak, and Hall Green Local Community Safety Partnership. Our goal is to keep Northfield High Street a priority and influence decisions about problems like business crime, shop theft, street begging, and drug abuse. This work is important for making Northfield a better place for trading. Partners on the CSP include:
o Birmingham City Council – Community Safety Partnership, Street Intervention team, Housing Department, Youth and Community engagement officers
o West Midlands Police – Northfield Constituency
o Children’s Trust Youth Offending Team
o Registered Social Housing Providers
o West Midlands Fire Service – Northfield
o Birmingham Solihull Mental Health Services
o Resident Representatives
o Third-sector or provider representatives, such as Trident Reach, Change Live Grow (CGL)
o Local Councillors
Our BID officers are actively engaging in working groups to bring together key partners, creating a unified response to tackle crime, anti-social behaviour (ASB), and community tensions in Northfield Town Centre. For Northfield Town Centre, the partnership work has included dealing with the ASB of school youths within the town centre after school and identifying prolific street drinkers, prolific street begging, homeless and shoplifters. Where required, offenders causing anti-social behaviour in the Town Centre are issued with Community Protection Orders, sometimes resulting in banning prolific offenders from the Town Centre and, in more severe cases, the imprisonment of the hardcore offenders. The LCSP has recognised Northfield Town Centre as one of its hotspot areas. With any project work associated with community safety, the LCSP partners will coordinate responses to reduce crime, anti-social behaviour and community tensions.
Birmingham City Council Street Intervention team was instrumental in teaming up with local landowners to take down an old bike shed on High Street, which was being used by some in the street community as a place for drug use. By removing the shed, they have helped make the area safer and more accessible for nearby businesses that rely on the space for parking. This change aims to discourage future encampments and protect the car parking area for everyone who uses it.
We work with Birmingham City Council and Maynineteen, the BID’s marketing and promotions partner, to manage street traders, charity collections and marketing communications to ensure that visitors to Northfield Town Centre are not plagued with bogus businesses that do not contribute to the viability of the BID area. Twenty-one bona fide businesses have actively promoted their business to the Northfield community during 2024 by providing a “retail-plus experience”.
We have continued our Storenet Retail Radio partnership with M.R.S Communications, with Northfield Shopping Centre acting as “Charlie One” for all the retail radio users within the BID area.
Promoting Northfield – capitalising on the high street’s “retail plus” offer.
We trialled the Northfield Nutcracker Trail in December 2023 as an event to bring young children and their parents/guardians to explore the retail-plus offerings of the Town Centre. Thirty-seven children took part in the two-week event. The prizes were five Argo vouchers ranging from £10 to £50. Although the event was put together at the last minute, the responses from the winners were brilliant. One of the grandparents said….
“… today I was delighted to collect my granddaughter’s prize from the Northfield Nutcracker Trail, which we completed during the Christmas holidays. We very much enjoyed the trail … [my granddaughter] is delighted with her win. Many thanks to the organisers, and we look forward to the next one.”
The Nutcracker Trail will be repeated in Northfield High Street from November to December 2024.
Throughout the year, the BID officers have continuously uploaded, updated, and maintained the Northfield BID Business with content to assist in their business operations and Reasons to Visit Informational website.
Since July 2024, the BID has partnered with the Piece of Cake marketing agency to boost the growth and visibility of its Visit Northfield social media pages. They have focused on expanding Visit Northfield's Facebook presence and created a dedicated Visit Northfield Instagram page to showcase all that the Northfield business community has to offer. From July to September, Piece of Cake has made impressive progress: they’ve grown Facebook and Instagram followers by 4.59%, reached 37,600 impressions, engaged around 1,596 people, and increased the number of posts to 72. By working with Piece of Cake, the BID has effectively replaced the need for a marketing and communications officer with the goal of promoting Northfield to the greater Birmingham area.
Supporting Northfield – influencing the decision makers when considering Northfield Town Centre issues and concerns.
The Northfield Town Centre BID team has delivered news and updates to the business community. In our latest newsletter, we are trialling something new with the Piece of Cake marketing agency. To reduce our carbon footprint, we will hand-deliver postcards with a QR code to local businesses. The QR code will take you to our latest newsletter [this one]. We hope to create online editions of the newsletter as a trial for the next 12 months, with four editions instead of the scheduled two.
In this online edition, we covered the notable highlights since the last newsletter in August, including a summary of the BID’s finances for April 2023 to March 2024. Tracy Prior and Carl Brown continue their roles (respectively) as BID Chairperson and BID Vice Chair (respectively).
The BID’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) and Open Forum took place in September 2023, featuring a productive discussion with Birmingham Northfield MP Gary Sambrook. This was the second meeting of its kind this year, with "Law and Order" as the main focus in April. September's discussion centred on the challenges of homelessness, street begging, and recurring offences impacting our town. Representatives from the City Council’s Street Intervention Team, the Community Safety Partnership, and West Midlands Police were on hand to address questions and provide guidance to our local business community.
Our commitment to keeping businesses informed remains strong. We share essential updates from the Government and Birmingham City Council through WhatsApp, Facebook, newsletters, and face-to-face interactions.
We recently secured funding through the Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund, with £10,510 awarded for our "Celebrate the BID’s Independent Sector" event in March 2024 and £13,600 to install protective bollards that safeguard visitors and prevent vehicle damage to our pavements. This project will be completed by the end of 2024/25.
Thank you for your ongoing support of the Northfield Town Centre BID. If you have any concerns or enquiries, please contact our BID officers, who are available Monday through Friday, 9 am to 5 pm.
Marcia Greenwood, Northfield BID Town Centre Manager
07921 818828
Tony Adams, Northfield BID Operations Support Officer/BID Caretaker
07809 904925
High Street Security Officer Contractor
(Sabre Commercial Protection)
07751 645712
DISCLAIMER
Whilst every effort has been given to ensure that the information contained within this publication is correct, Northfield Town Centre BID Ltd cannot be held responsible for any errors or omissions contained within. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the express consent of its publishers, including any advertisement originating as part of the production process.
Manuscripts, photographs, and other materials submitted to the publications are sent at the owner’s risk. Neither the company nor its agents accept any liability for loss or damage. Some products in this newsletter may be represented or similar products available in retail stores, and any stock illustrations are subject to availability.
The Northfield BID newsletter published by Northfield Town Centre BID Ltd. Northfield BID Board of Directors does not necessarily endorse the views expressed or the editorial content. Additionally, Northfield Town Centre BID Ltd is not responsible for the performance of goods or services provided by implementing any ideas or activities suggested in this newsletter, which are entirely at an individual’s discretion and risk.
Northfield Town Centre BID Limited
C/o Northfield Baptist Church
789 Bristol Road South
Northfield
Birmingham B31 2NQ
Registered in England: 7889072 Registered as VAT number: 130 9752 18
Registered office: c/o 789 Bristol Road South, Northfield, Birmingham B31 2NQ
Comentarios