UK lags behind European rivals as hub for creative agencies
The UK is trailing behind its rivals in the competition to become Europe’s best place for creative agencies, according to new data from Sortlist.
Figures from the advertising industry analysts show that Belgium has the most creative agencies per capita of any country in the world, with 22.9 creative firms per 100,000 people.
Meanwhile, the UK has just 2.4 creative agencies per 100,000 citizens, putting it behind its European rivals including the Netherlands (8.8 per 100,000), Spain (8.3), France (7.0), Switzerland (4.9) and Denmark. The UK did however come out ahead of Ireland (2.2), Germany (2.0), and Austria (1.6)
On a global level, Asia’s economic powerhouses including Hong Kong (2.3) and Singapore (5.1) ranked well in terms of the number of creative firms per person.
On the other hand, the USA lingered near the bottom, with just 0.7 creative companies per 100,000 citizens, while Japan, Russia, and South Korea, all performed poorly with just 0.1 creative agencies per 100,000 people.
In terms of the UK, the figures show that London has some of the highest concentrations of creative agencies per capita, with particularly high concentrations in the London borough of Richmond (17.83 agencies per 50,000 people) and in Canada (85.1 agencies per 50,000) – in part due to the square mile’s tiny population of 9,000 people.
The capital’s high rates of creative agencies per capita put London ahead of the UK’s other major creative hubs including Glasgow, Newcastle, and Leicester
In-demand skills
In terms of industries, the rankings show that demand for mobile app developers and web designers is at an all time high, while the events industry continues to suffer from the impacts of the coronavirus.
The analysis found that there is particularly high demand for tech workers with analytics skills and user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) skills.
The analysis also shows that games companies have the highest average budgets followed by app developers.