Cool is uncool, Wellington warned a decade after embracing coolness

Sunday, 31 January 2021

Wellington has worn the title of the coolest little capital proudly since 2010 but is now being told it just ain't cool to call yourself cool.

International marketing expert Brian Sweeney, a former Wellingtonian now based in New York, was paid $12,000 by WellingtonNZ to write a 600-word opinion piece, which ran on Stuff, and to talk to invited guests about how to market and promote Wellington.

WellingtonNZ chief executive John Allen said the presentation was one in a series of sessions looking at how to change the perception that Wellington was “stuffed” and because there was a concern about the city’s place in a Covid-hit world.

They come as Wellington suffers through transport “sclerosis”, major infrastructure needs, housing issues, a tired central city, stalled international education, and quake and climate threats - all issues highlighted by Sweeney, who believed Wellington was “a bit aimless, looking for purpose”.

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“I'm cool on cool. Cool is received, not taken, It’s worn not spoken,” Sweeney’s PowerPoint presentation, released to Stuff under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act, said.

“Cool is not the right decibel for the moment,” he said.

“Little. Banish the word. We’re not Hobbits. Little is an excuse not to succeed. Little scales downwards.”

It was late-2010 when Lonely Planet named Wellington the fourth best city in which to travel in the world, behind New York, Tangier and Tel Aviv and also dubbed it the “coolest little capital in the world”.

'To have Lonely Planet … come out and refer to Wellington as the 'coolest little capital in the world' and among the top 10 cities you must visit for 2011 is quite simply incredible,” Positively Wellington Tourism chief executive David Perks said as we basked in that 2010 glory.

Perks would go onto work at WellingtonNZ. His chief executive, John Allen, was this week cooler on the cool: “It is not something that you say about yourself.

“It is something that you should be getting from others, which of course originally [we did].”

He agreed we should ditch the “little’: “The use of ‘little’ is not necessarily the right way to be thinking about the city. I like the language of being a city of ‘consequence’.”

The concept of “consequential”, Sweeney said, was where Wellington should be hanging its hat: “We need to step up and be consequential every day.”

“What it means,” said Allen, “Is this is a city where stuff happens. It is a place where important innovation occurs.”

Success for Allen would be for Wellington to become a city that young people wanted to come to. But there was much – outside his remit – that needed fixing to get there. Housing was increasingly unaffordable, our public transport needed fixing, and our infrastructure was failing.

As Allen was talking on Tuesday, contractors were working furiously two blocks away to stop wastewater flowing into the harbour after a 110-year-old pipe broke beneath a central city street. But Allen said there were still drawcards for young people.

“They come here because they can do stuff here, because this is an exciting city where things are happening. Part of that is politics, part of that is policy … and part of it is about the technological opportunities, and the creative opportunities that are being unlocked through that technology.”

Prior to Sweeney's presentation was one from New Zealand economist David Skilling, based in Netherlands, which also cost about $12,000. More sessions, from locally-based New Zealanders, are planned.

While “coolest little capital” was never Wellington’s official slogan, other places have come up with some questionable tag lines (official or unofficial) , some of which were later ditched:

• Of course you Canterbury.

• Dunedin, it's all right here.

• Hamilton, more than you expect.

• Right Up My Hutt Valley.

• Take a Liking to a Viking (Dannevirke).

• P-Town (Porirua)