Created as a publicly and privately-funded business, NewcastleGateshead Initiative has become one of the North East's biggest flag wavers. CHRIS KNOX caught up with its chief executive Sarah Stewart

IT’S hard to come away from a meeting with Sarah Stewart and not feel proud of the Newcastle and Gateshead area, particularly as the offices of the NewcastleGateshead Initiative are surrounded by a host of new hotel and office developments that are soon to transform the area’s skyline once again.

Although originally born in Cheltenham, it’s clear that Stewart has long since become an adopted North Eastener, such is her passion for and commitment to championing the many attractions that Newcastle and Gateshead have to offer.

It is also to the region’s advantage that Stewart has crafted her skills of persuasion into a fine art, having built up an impressive CV that boasts marketing campaigns for some of the region’s biggest brands, including Greggs, Sage and Newcastle Building Society.

It is a career that is founded on a solid academic background, which saw the mother-of-two studying history and law at Cambridge University.

She says: “I was born in Cheltenham as the youngest of four girls and lived there until I was eight or nine, at which point we moved to Bristol. I went to a big comprehensive school in Bristol and got on really well academically and socially.

“It was totally out of the blue that it was suggested that I should try to get into Cambridge.

“However, I heard that the head of the sixth form had said that he was unsure of pushing us as so many previous students had failed to get in and there was a risk we could see ourselves as failures for our entire lives.

“Well that’s all I needed to give me the motivation to get in.”

However, academia wasn’t always at the forefront of her mind. She says: “Even at Cambridge I didn’t really have a defined role in mind. I did a lot of horse-riding as a youngster and had ambitions to become a three-day eventer or something.

“I also wanted to be a land manager at a large country estate as I thought that this would allow me to continue riding and pursue other outdoor pursuits.”

It would be Stewart’s stay in Newcastle with Procter & Gamble that would turn her mind to more urban surroundings, with the consumer giant providing a guided tour of the region as a way of enticing her with the role of brand manager.

She says: “After deciding that I wanted to take a more business- orientated route to my career, I agreed to spend a week in Newcastle with P&G as a way of introducing myself to the North East.

“You have to remember that it was 1981 and you certainly wouldn’t have been looking at the kind of riverscape that we are lucky to have now.”

“I went back to Bristol and told my parents that I wanted to work in Newcastle and all they could say was ‘why do you want to work in a smokey hole in the North when you can work anywhere?’.

“I just remember telling them that it wasn’t all that bad. I guess even then I was turning into a one-woman publicity campaign for Newcastle and Gateshead.”

Stewart, who lives with her husband Alistair, son Nicholas and daughter Catherine in Gosforth got to cut her teeth early on at P&G and had a pivotal part to play in breathing new life into one of the UK’s most infamous advertising campaigns, the Daz Doorstep Challenge.

She laughs: “I can’t take the whole credit for unleashing the Daz Doorstep Challenge on the world, but I certainly worked on the re-invention of the campaign and the ‘would you take two of your regular powders for one Daz offer.’

“I also worked on the ‘hands that do dishes’ campaign for Fairy Liquid, which had Nanette Newman as our spokesperson at the time.

“They were certainly campaigns that people remember, and on that basis were really successful.”

After working for years for London-based Deloitte Haskins & Sells, as a marketing consultant, and then with PricewaterhouseCoopers, where she recruited and managed teams of consultants in Newcastle, Leeds, Manchester and Scotland, Stewart welcomed the opportunity to put down some long-term roots in the North East after joining software giant Sage in 1991.

As a member of the main board, she fast became involved in all aspects of the company’s rapid expansion.

She says: “During my time as a partner at PwC, one of my favourite clients was Sage. As I had been involved in the company fairly early on I was able to build up relationships with founders David Goldman, Graham Wylie and Paul Walker, as well as former director Tom Maxfield.

“The company had already gone public by that stage and was starting out on the international acquisition trail, so it was a fantastic time to join.

“It was really about trying to apply some of the classic brand techniques, I had learned, to Sage.

“David Goldman has always said that Sage is not a technology company but a marketing company.

“It was a fantastic challenge to be able to prove to people that what could be seen as a boring accountancy software product was in fact really interesting and hugely applicable to businesses of all sizes.

“Again, it all comes back to changing perceptions.”

After three years at Sage, Stewart decided to go it alone as a independent management consultant as a way of adding flexibility to her new life as a mother, a role that would see her market some of the region’s most iconic brands as well as begin her career as a campaigner of the Newcastle and Gateshead.

She says: “I had started to work for Greggs while at PwC and managed to maintain a strong relationship with Sir Mike Darrington and his management team during my time as an independent management consultant.

“Much of my work was helping to prove the case that Greggs should shift away from its image as a baker and move to fast food retailer.

“I later became involved after Greggs acquired a number of companies, which saw me working to bring them under a constant national brand and helping staff to get up to speed with Greggs’ practices.”

Other projects included refreshing the Newcastle Building Society brand as well as joining the board of the Port of Tyne to help publicise its facilities at a time when the port was looking to expand its car terminal having just won a contract with Nissan.

It was during that Stewart was asked to be deputy chair of the International Centre for Life as it looked to add weight to its brand beyond the North East.

She says: “It was a very interesting time for me, as at one point I was involved with an organisation that was very much at the cutting edge of scientific discovery, including stem cell research, as well as one that was very much still ingrained in heavy industry and reliant on traditional manufacturing.

“This also opened other doors for me and I was asked by Paul Walker, who had become chair of Science City to join his advisory group, to join his board.

“This gave me another platform on which to promote the great work that was going on in Newcastle and Gateshead.

“Increasingly, I became involved in a range of regional development issues, which included a number of non-exec appointments.”

After serving a year as an interim chief executive of the NewcastleGateshead Initiative, following the departure of former boss Andrew Dixon to become head of Creative Scotland, Stewart was handed the full-time chief executive role.

The appointment comes as the initiative faces one of its most challenging periods, with major funding at some of the region’s main tourist boards and the impending closure of regional development agency One North East meaning there are far less organisations blowing the trumpet for the region.

Although next year’s closure of One North East will impact on the initiative’s resources, it has benefited from strong support from both Newcastle and Gateshead councils, which have maintained their levels of funding for over the last two years.

This has allowed it to continue to support a wide range of events and activities, including Newcastle Fashion Week later this month and food festival EAT!

New developments for 2011 also include the creation of a Bridges Festival with the river at the heart of a programme of performance, sport and spectacle which will bring together partnerships between NewcastleGateshead Initiative, The Sage Gateshead, Baltic, Port of Tyne and British Rowing, to name a few.