Retail Birmingham appoints new chair

Retail Birmingham Business Improvement District (BID) has appointed Jonathan Cheetham, General Manager of The Pallasades Shopping Centre, as its new chairman.

Mr Cheetham has been a board member of Birmingham’s retail BID since it was established in 2007, and has chaired the City Centre Partnership since 2003, a position he will stepping down from in April 2011. He takes up his new position from Alan Chatham and will lead Retail Birmingham’s renewal ballot campaign this year.

Commenting on his appointment, Jonathan said:
“Under Alan’s chairmanship the BID has implemented real improvements to make Birmingham’s central shopping district a much safer, cleaner and more attractive place for visitors and I intend to move forward Alan’s long term vision to improve the streetscape, accessibility and connectivity in the BID area.”
“Additional marketing activity and events such as Style Birmingham Live have enabled the city to attract large numbers of additional shoppers and boosted our profile nationally, which is crucial to maintaining a healthy trading environment. 2011 will continue to be a challenging year for our members and I will be working closely with the board and our retailers to build on these successes and deliver support where it is needed most.”

Natalie Strachan from The Mailbox has been appointed as marketing champion, alongside transport champion Tim Walley (Bullring), property champion Richard Norgrove (Hortons), business support champion and vice chair Gay Faulkner (Great Western Arcade) and independents champion, Claudia Santillo (Benjamin Ryan).

Retail Birmingham has also recently welcomed additional board members including Matt Scriven, managing director of Bitters n’Twisted Venues and Amy Dickson, sales manager of McDonald Burlington Hotel.