Every BID invests heavily in major town centre events. But when stakeholders ask what those events actually delivered, how confident are you in your answer? Reading BID decided gut instinct wasn’t enough and partnered with Visitor Insights to find out what their Christmas Light Switch On really achieved.
+57%
FOOTFALL UPLIFT VS THE PREVIOUS MONTH
+36%
INCREASE YEAR ON YEAR
124 min
AVERAGE DWELL TIME ON EVENT DAY
The challenge: evidencing what you already believe
Large-scale events like a Christmas Light Switch On take months of planning, significant resource and real budget. For most BIDs, the evidence base to justify that investment has traditionally been limited, a footfall counter, a few social media impressions, and a general sense that it went well.
Reading BID wanted more than that. The team needed robust, real-world data to quantify how events influence visitor behaviour and not just in terms of numbers through the door, but dwell time, catchment reach and whether the event was genuinely growing and diversifying their audience.
What the data showed
Using Visitor Insights’ Terain platform, the BID analysed performance across a geofenced town centre area on 15th November 2025, benchmarked against a typical trading day the previous month and the same date a year earlier.
The headline numbers confirmed what the team had hoped – a significant uplift in visits and a meaningful increase in dwell time, suggesting visitors weren’t just attending the event but engaging with the wider town centre. Retailers, hospitality venues and leisure businesses all stood to benefit.
But it was the deeper behavioural insight that proved most valuable. Catchment mapping and demographic profiling told a more nuanced story about who the event attracted and where they came from, intelligence that has direct implications for how Reading BID plans and targets future activations.
Why it matters beyond the day itself
A single successful event is one thing. A repeatable, evidence-based events strategy is another. The data Reading BID now holds doesn’t just validate what happened in November, it gives them a framework for making smarter decisions about future investment, targeting and planning.
It also provides the kind of credible evidence base that funders and stakeholders increasingly expect to see before committing support.
Maria Lloyd, Head of Marketing, REDA, emphasized the importance of the data around these events:
“The report clearly shows how these events can benefit our centre – by bringing in people from outside our usual catchment area, and by attracting a more diverse range of visitors”
Discover the full insights behind Reading’s BID value in data behind their event.
Download the complete case study from Visitor Insights to explore the catchment maps, and actionable data that can help your business or organization make informed decisions for events.
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