Challenge

With never-ending market pressures comes the constant need to reconfigure industrial infrastructures, sometimes resulting in temporary or partial closures or shut-downs. When a company moves out of a community, pressure from different shareholders, or the company’s own desire to maintain their reputation as a responsible employer, often encourages them to lead economic regeneration initiatives for future job creation, and allows them to stay in touch with local organisations. We were asked to support and facilitate one such process at a old chemical works site in France, as follows.

Solution

Following the company’s departure, we supported the marketing of the other local companies that remained in the area, and researched complementary organisations that would have a potential interest in setting up nearby. Local organisations were interviewed to describe and promote their expertise and to showcase projects of potential interest to external partners. To support this, videos were made of local companies’ existing or planned future projects, uploaded onto a digital platform and sent to targeted companies. This plan of action attracted a range of dynamic organisations that were keen to develop and set-up new operations.

Result

These measures have helped to activate and energise the local business community via the identification of new activities, relevant to the nature of the local economy. They have also facilitated positive contact with an ecosystem of relevant companies. Ultimately, these initiatives have led to 3 major ‘industrial’ projects and created over one hundred jobs.