Council reveals plans for a Digital Christmas Festival

For the 2020 festive season, businesses across Bridgend County Borough are being invited to take part in an all-new Digital Christmas festival event.

Designed to support local businesses by providing opportunities for showcasing products while enabling shoppers to browse at their leisure, the festival will also offer residents safe, alternative ways of celebrating Christmas in town centres while the coronavirus pandemic remains in effect.

The initiative, which is being developed on behalf of Bridgend County Borough Council by EPM Creative, will run from 14 November – 5 January as a pandemic replacement for the regular Christmas lights event.

While it is mainly centred on the towns of Porthcawl, Maesteg and Bridgend, the festival will also be open to all businesses in the county borough who want to join in.

You can find out more on how your business can be part of the Digital Christmas Festival by registering at the EPM Creative’s webpage.

Once registered, businesses will automatically receive a free listing on the Digital Christmas website as well as their local town centre App (or the town centre App which is geographically nearest to them) for the duration of the event.

As part of the festival, shoppers who use the App in the towns they visit will have a chance of winning golden tickets for a personalised message from Santa Claus.

A virtual flight through Santa’s grotto is also being planned as part of the Digital Christmas Festival experience, plus virtual meet-and-greets with Santa’s reindeers.

The council’s cabinet member for communities Councillor Richard Young said: “We have been developing plans for a different way to celebrate the festive season to replace this year’s Christmas lights event in Bridgend town centre.

“The Digital Christmas Festival is a way to help support our local organisations, traders and businesses as they engage with the general public and also provide a means for our residents to participate in some of the magic and excitement of Christmas.

“With shops reopening after the firebreak lockdown, we want to do everything we can to support retailers subject to Welsh Government restrictions.”

After registering, a draft of the business’ page on the website will be sent to the business for approval together with more details of how businesses can place promotional offers on the website and App.

Paul Whittaker of EPM Creative said: “We are very excited to be managing and presenting a new concept for the digital Christmas experience for Bridgend County Borough Council.

“We hope that this will increase footfall for the participating towns as well as go some way to replace the events that would have happened in each town but are unattainable due to the current circumstances.”