The Experience Economy: Beyond The Big Cities
- Molly Phillips
- 2 days ago
- 5 min read
It's an experience economy. Memorable, immersive experiences sell not only the product, but also the brand itself.
And yet, beyond big cities like London, Birmingham, and Manchester, it can be hard to find many brand experiences.
As a Norfolk business, we want to change that, wherever we can.
Why?
Well, time has taught us that experiential and events marketing gives your brand the edge. It connects audiences on a more personal level with the work you’re doing, and it helps you to establish trust, and carve out an identity for yourself.
Plus, it’s fun!
To explore this further, we’ll have a look at what an experience economy actually is, and how it can take hold of smaller cities, like our hometown of Norwich.
Ready? Let’s go...
What Is An ‘Experience Economy’?
The term ‘experience economy’ refers to the value customers place – subconsciously or otherwise – on immersivity in and involvement with a product.
As a concept, it is older than you might imagine; it derives from the late 1990s, popularised by Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore. But, of course, it has only developed since then.
The world of marketing and advertising becomes more saturated by technology, AI, and social media; all of which are useful in terms of reaching large audiences, and spreading the word, but which also place a screen between the consumer, and the brand that can make things seem rather impersonal.
Pine and Gilmore were referring to the theory that, when faced with a coffee brand, for example, a customer is more likely to say, ‘Remember those coffees we bought from that little deli in Southwark? Man, they were so good. We should definitely buy some beans from them!”, as opposed to “Remember that Guatemalan coffee which had an earthy aroma and chocolate undertones?”
Why? Because the experience is what makes a product memorable, human, and connectable. As humans, we talk about things we’ve experienced and places we’ve been. We create shared memories around those things.
Now, there's definitely a time and place for in-depth descriptions of delicious coffee beans (your website, for example, if you’re a coffee-roaster).
But to really make your brews memorable (we’re RUNNING with this analogy now), you’ll want to combine those beautiful descriptions with beautiful experiences, too.
In the context of today’s busy marketing scene, the experience economy means attending events or creating unique, eye-catching brand experiences which get people talking. Experiential marketing can refer to:
Exhibitions at attractions, conferences, events and museums – like this recent David Bowie’s life exhibition in London, or a bespoke exhibition stand at Crufts
Hospitality and hotels – like when e.l.f Cosmetics took over the iconic Regency Cafe, or a Murder Mystery-themed night at a hotel
Installations in retail settings – pop-up brand experiences in your local shopping mall, or billboards that make you stop and stare, like the ‘Together At Ramadan’ billboard. This interactive image advertised Tesco food to the Muslim community in the UK, by featuring meals that disappeared and reappeared in accordance to Islamic fasting times.
Everyday, customer-facing roles – so, every cafe you go into and every cinema you visit is an experience, that needs consideration. We go into more detail about this sort of work in our Experiential Edge series.
Experiential Marketing in UK Cities
In big cities like London, Manchester, Birmingham—and, of course, places like New York, too—experiential marketing is common.
Lots of London is built around the concept of experiential marketing. Take Oxford Street for example. The big, shiny billboards are very much part of the furniture. Oxford Street is defined by its marketing.
Similarly, Covent Garden Piazza hosts frequent pop-ups. As of the end of April 2026, Peroni are scheduled to bring a huge, beer-dispensing mural to the famous square to advertise their products.
At the same time, places like Battersea Power Station can be hired out for marketing events and experiential. Often, big brands take advantage of this fact; you’ll have seen us discuss the Bridgerton Experience in our article on ‘The Psychology of Events Marketing’.
More recently, a big experiential company has launched a portal at the same venue. Brands can book this portal to display one-off pop-up experiences in an area with high footfall, or they can encompass it as part of their overall campaign, or a tour of experiences.
Further up North, in Manchester, the fitness brand MyProtein are looking to launch an experience called ‘Food Escapes’. It responds to ‘growing demand for experiential activities and competitive socialising’ and will require participants to follow a trail of WhatsApp clues around the city. Players will find answers to these clues hidden in plain sight, in the city’s architecture. Once complete, they unlock as series of secret dining locations and a curated dish.
That is to say that MyProtein have turned the very fabric of Manchester into one large experience. Talk about experience economy!
All of these experiences and events are relatively large-scale, which, it could be argued, fall under the heading of ‘stunt marketing’. As we’ve discussed before, smaller brands don’t have to produce such enormous spectacles.
But what we can see is that experiential is a big deal.
Last year, it was revealed that £10bn was invested in London’s experience economy.
The brands in big cities have learned the power of experiential. The edge it can give you, and the connections it can forge.
And yet it is often an underserved area over in our hometown of Norwich.
London has the monopoly; we say businesses should look to change that. What do you say?
Small Town Experiential is Possible – We Know Because We Do It
We deliver first-class exhibitions and experiences all over the place. London, Manchester, Nuremberg. You name it.
And, though we work with Norwich locals like ourselves quite often, it’s quite rare that we get asked to exhibit in East Anglia itself.
But it does happen.
For example: Fellow Norvicans, you might remember a couple of years ago, when a giant, red shoebox appeared in Castle Quarter in the city, during the October half-term.
That was the result of a partnership we made with Shoebox Experiences. The pop-up experience achieved a great deal in terms of attracting intrigue to the work Shoebox does. Overall, it supported brand recognition, helped people form connections with the brand, and utilised the heart of that experience economy to do so.
People are, after all, more likely to remember a giant shoebox in their shopping mall, than they are, say, a flyer or a social media post. But put those two things in combination with each other—i.e. including the pop-up experience as PART of a multi-channel campaign?
Now you’re talking.
That’s what our pop-ups and exhibitions do: they work with your digital marketing to create that memorable nature that only experiential can bring.
Small Town Superstar?
Norwich locals! We’d love to help local businesses exhibit on home turf.
And beyond Norwich, into other cities where there’s a real gap for experiential marketing—we want to help fill that gap with your brand!
If either of these are a goal you share, let us know.
Let’s get people talking.
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