Halloween in the City Centre

The evening of Thursday 31st October saw Piccadilly Spooktacular take place - a family-friendly event of music, entertainment, thrills and treats of course!

We welcomed thousands of people to Piccadilly where families enjoyed apple bobbing, cookie decorating at The Quarter (which proved to be such a mammoth success, we cleared out the cake decorating supplies at both Tesco AND Sainsburys during the evening), live entertainment from local music acts including Samantha Lloyd, Adrenalize, Jay Johnson and Macious, circus performances, scare actors and a fire show.

Some feedback we received included:

"We attended the Piccadilly Spooktacular event last night and it was amazing! All that fun, all of those sweets completely free! It meant my little boy could have the fun of trick or treating in the safety of the event! Well done! Exactly what Stoke needs and I hope there are more to come" – Claire Roddis on Facebook

"Well done to all involved - I work on Piccadilly and it’s great to see these type of events that have been arranged just lately and are helping to make Hanley lively once more 👏👏👏" - Yvonne Bennett on Facebook

"Local officers have been engaging with members of the public visiting #Spooktacular on Piccadilly this evening. It was fab to see families enjoying Halloween and we have seen some great costumes. @StokeontrentBID have done a brilliant job organising such a fun evening. 🤡🎃🧛‍♂‍🍭 " – Hanley Police @Hanleypolice on Twitter

"We went up last night for an hour with my daughter early on and it was fantastic. Definitely return next year and probably have tea out as well. Big respect to everyone involved making it happen." - Mark @SomeMightSay95 on Twitter

"Just to say a massive thanks to @StokeontrentBID for an enjoyable evening in Piccadilly with my family; enjoying the atmosphere and entertainment provided! Then topped the evening with Tapas and Tunes with Shaun Walker in The Quarter! Same again next year please? 🧙‍♀‍🎃👻" - Michelle Greenwell @Shellwellies on Twitter

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who brought their friends and families along to the event; we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!

In addition, we'd like to thank every business (over 100 of them!) who took part in PIMP MY PUMPKIN. 154 amazing pumpkins were submitted to the competition, showing the real creativity and artistic flair of those in our City Centre.

Congratulations to our winners and runners-up...
1st prize - A hotel break: Matt Jones from River Island
2nd prize - Meal for 2 at The Quarter and 2 tickets for a show at The Regent Theatre: Marisha Monaghan from River Island
3rd prize - 2 Cineworld tickets: Vickie Hughes from TH Baker

Everyone who took part did a great job. The pumpkin displays in businesses throughout the town made it look a really spooktacular place, and the social media contest invited a bit of friendly competition and a whole lot of engagement. 

For instance, our Facebook page insights show we were up 1244% on page views during the Halloween period, with page likes up 509%, post reach up 459%, new page followers up 533% and post engagement up 630%.

We were absolutely thrilled to receive this lovely compliment from Phil at Equilibrium on Piccadilly too: "A massive vote of thanks to all of the BID team associated with the Piccadilly PIMP MY PUMPKIN event. The hard work involved in preparing and delivering it is much appreciated by the businesses and visitors. Everything has passed off smoothly and seems to have been enjoyed by all. It's a good bonding experience for the businesses too. I've been in business in Piccadilly for over 22 years since the inception of the Cultural Quarter and the area has never been so vibrant due to the influences of many individuals and groups. Well done‼️"