Policy and Society

How we work

Miller Research has a long track record of delivering innovative regeneration and place-based projects. Our specialist skills in project management, stakeholder engagement and innovative solutions are complemented by the specialist skills of carefully selected associates who share our values. These include landscape architects, Macgregor Smith, community artist Howard Bowcott and property specialists Alder King.

Key projects

Miller Research developed a cross-disciplinary Retail Distinctiveness toolkit for ONE North East, the former development agency for North East England. The model was used to assess the competitive position of market towns through a comprehensive audit of factors which delivered a distinctive experience; ranging from the setting of the town through the historic narratives present in the architecture, the range and quality of independent shops and local food outlets down to street furniture and hanging baskets. Results were plotted against more mainstream vitality and viability measures to place each town in its competitive context. The model was highly successful as an entry point to devising town action plans and has been used in more than 25 towns across the UK, from Wooler in Northumberland to Henley on Thames in South Oxfordshire.

We see events as a critical means of bringing people together and encouraging visitors. We have have developed and supported several food festival across the UK, providing long-term sponsorship for Abergavenny Food Festival and designing the Newport Food Festival as part of a commission for Newport City Council and Newport Unlimited to nurture artisan food as a counterbalance to more corporate retail development. The event placed emphasis on wider community ownership through young people's cooking competitions, radio advert production through the local University and up-skilling people in silver service training for the food festival supper - which featured three Michelin-starred chefs cooking in the Victorian market hall. The festival has become an established date in the calendar and has done much to change perceptions of the city.

We bring specific expertise to communities in engagement and consultation, project management, sustainable funding and management solutions. This is backed by strong quantitative and qualitative research skills and excellent inter-personal skills – we really get to know communities and the people that live in them. We have a strong focus on local assets and have used locally-mined slate for participants to write on in workshops in Blaenau Ffestiniog, turf to map issues about open spaces in public meetings and taken stakeholders on a train trip to their own town to understand the visitor experience.