Strategic Network Apeldoorn Discusses City Branding

22.03.2023

WUAS helping promote Apeldoorn as a green and royal city

On 15 February, a group of representatives from Strategic Network Apeldoorn, including CEO of Wittenborg University of Applied Sciences Maggie Feng, came to the Apenheul to discuss the city branding of Apeldoorn. The purpose of the meeting was to visualize the city of Apeldoorn in the year 2025 and how the board plans to achieve it. Apeldoorn has great potential to become an interesting and thriving city. Despite Apeldoorn being the 11th largest city in the country and praised for its green character, the board concluded that Apeldoorn could do with some marketing to make the city more interesting for tourists and industries.

The two main features of promoting Apeldoorn are its biggest factors and rural character: green and royal. These characteristics are based on the Apeldoorn environment enriched with beautiful nature and the presence of the Dutch royal family at Palace 't Loo in Apeldoorn. The meeting was moderated by Jos Vranken, director of the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions. Other speakers included Erik Braun, professor at Erasmus University and Copenhagen Business School, who gave his views on city marketing and how it can be used strategically to promote a city, and Claudi Groot Koerkamp, director of Apeldoorn Partners.

"To market Apeldoorn well you need a few million euros. Let's stop thinking in separate campaigns and fragmented marketing budgets and start working together on powerful promotion of the city. I believe in the direction Apeldoorn Marketing has set for the city," said Maggie Feng. "Wittenborg welcomes a strong city branding and will continue to monitor the development of Apeldoorn's image. A city that is green, has a green heart, must have a lot of biodiversity. Many interpretations can be given to the word 'Green' we think."

This meeting will be used by Apeldoorn Partners to create a story for the city of Apeldoorn which can be used to make Apeldoorn commercially interesting and really put the city on the map.