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Understanding the Current and Future Value of the Beatles Legacy in Liverpool (2015-16)

This research project establishes a baseline understanding of what the Beatles legacy and ‘industry’ is worth to the city of Liverpool, focusing not only on economic value but also the intangible benefit to the Liverpool ‘brand’. The research catalogues and maps Liverpool’s Beatles-related cultural offer for the first time, estimating the current value of the Beatles legacy, identifying gaps in cultural provision, and projecting the future potential value of the Beatles legacy if such gaps are addressed.

Working alongside partners Culture Liverpool, Merseytravel, the National Trust and Marketing Liverpool, the Institute of Cultural Capital oversaw the research elements of the project in collaboration with the Institute of Popular Music (Department of Music – University of Liverpool) and the European Institute of Urban Affairs (Liverpool John Moores University). The report produced by the research partners is orientated around the policy needs of the project stakeholders, and will help to engage and mobilise those within the local Beatles legacy industry by providing robust intelligence and recommendations on which to act. The research team’s final report is structured around four core research elements:

  • Historical mapping. This provides a concise mapping of the historical events and actions that tie the Beatles to specific places, spaces and events within the city of Liverpool. The final report highlights the importance of these key locales and events to potential legacy, visitor and city branding value.
  • Space and place mapping of the city’s current Beatles offer.  This strand of the research involved the mapping of the current cultural and heritage offer with regards to the Beatles within the city of Liverpool. This was compared to the historical mapping, with strong, weak and missing provision identified.
  • Cultural impact of the Beatles on the past, current and future character of the city. This strand of the research provides a concise account of the past, current and future non-economic value of the Beatles to the character of the city.
  • Regional economic impact of the Beatles legacy and future possibilities. Here, the outcomes of the first, second and third research strands were used to provide an economic impact assessment of the current and future potential impacts of the Beatles legacy on the city.

The final report of the project team, which was published on 8 February 2016, is available in the project downloads section.

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