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The restoration of Stockton Globe leads the expansion of Ambassador Theatre Group’s (ATG) portfolio of music-led venues, demonstrating the company’s intention to become a major player in the live music and comedy industries. With close to 50 worldwide venues including in the West End and on Broadway, ATG is the authority in live entertainment, selling c.11m tickets every year and operating the UK’s most visited theatre website ATGtickets.com.
Already a part of local and music industry history, Stockton Globe originally opened its doors in 1935. During its life as an entertainment venue it has played host to many international names from The Beatles and The Rolling Stones to Sadler’s Wells Ballet and the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company. The Globe’s previous life as a live entertainment venue came to an end in 1974.
Sundae oversaw the full publicity campaign, inclusive of launching the venue’s social media channels, from ATG’s operational announcement in early 2019 right through to the first anniversary of the venue’s reopening in Autumn 2022.
Sundae started working on the publicity campaign for the restoration of historic art-deco venue Stockton Globe on behalf of new operator ATG in early 2019, looking after the campaign around the announcement that it would reopen as a live entertainment venue for the first time since 1974 following an extensive restoration.
The successful relationship continued for the next three and a half years, as Sundae was invited to oversee all publicity on an ongoing basis throughout the restoration process, the launch, new hires within the management team, profiling the GM and other members of the management team, pre-launch events, numerous show announcements for the launch season and beyond, the first show on the new stage, the development of sibling venue The LINK, the first anniversary of the venue’s reopening, and everything in between.
Looking after publicity for Stockton Globe throughout a global pandemic brought many a new challenge to our door, but the inarguably difficult times also presented an opportunity to step into the future with some forward thinking concepts that would never have featured traditionally.
Under various states of restriction, we devised and facilitated a virtual press launch for Stockton Globe using green screen technology, with cameos from some of the announced acts including Jools Holland, Steve Hackett and Midge Ure, and performance clips contributed by the House and Garage Orchestra, Ross Noble and Chris Ramsey.
As well as this, we put together a hybrid launch for Stockton Globe’s little sibling venue, The LINK, that took the form of a music based TV show in front of a live audience and streamed out to guests at home.
A huge highlight of the campaign was the opening show when McFly had the honour of being the very first artists to perform on the Globe’s iconic stage following its spectacular £28 million restoration; a poignant moment for the venue and its staff, generating a huge amount of regional and national media coverage.
Another highlight of the campaign came when the venue welcomed legendary photographer Ian Wright as guest of honour for its royal opening, after being closed for 47 years. Ian hosted an intimate ‘audience with’ event, in which he talked through the moments in history he experienced in his time shooting at the Globe, led by the exclusive images that kick-started his illustrious career.
He also gave a tour of the historic Grade II-listed Art Deco venue’s permanent exhibition of his iconic work, which includes exclusive portraits of The Beatles and Mick Jagger, until now only shown at the National Portrait Gallery. Needless to say, Ian’s work and stories garnered massive support from the press, with a number of national interviews on the day.
Over the course of our journey with ATG’s Stockton Globe, we placed hundreds of pieces of coverage, with notable support from Total Production International, IQ Mag, Music Week, Access All Areas, Arts Professional, the Daily Express, the Daily Telegraph, The Stage, British Comedy Guide, Teesside Live, Narc, Northern Echo, BBC News Online, ITV.com, BBC Radio Tees and BBC Look North and ITV Tyne Tees, plus many more.
Photos by Gary Calton, Sally Ann Norman, and Salford Borough Council
"Photographer Ian Wright was just 18 when he captured The Beatles on stage on 22 November 1963. But the photos never made it into his newspaper because of an event half-way around the world."
"New features include flexible standing and seated configuration, new purpose-built bars, VIP areas, dressing room suites, orchestra pits and an additional 200-capacity gig venue and cafe bar, The Link."
