Scotland - the quite good not terribly big country

by - 15:39 on 27 August 2007

So, the slogan ‘Scotland the best small country in the world’ has been abandoned, eh? Yes, it did rather suggest limited aspirations. Here’s my advice for the design agencies who will now be forming an orderly queue in the hope of earning large sums of money for dreaming up a new tag-line.

The best phrases when attached to Scotland or its component parts have to fulfil some essential criteria. Firstly, they must be more or less devoid of meaning in order not to offend local politicians. ‘Dumfries and Galloway – naturally inspiring’ is an example of this. Nobody could take offence. Good choice. Then there is ‘Aberdeen City and Shire’, chosen to unite the two elements of the right-hand top endy bit of Scotland which has an, uhmm, city and also a bit outside it. Completely anodyne. Harmless. Unless it was chosen to convey the impression that the hinterland of Aberdeen was populated by hobbits. Perhaps there was a film tie-in that I missed.

Try to work in a wee pun if you can. I see that Fife favours ‘The Kingdom of Life’. Obviously you have to know that Fife was a Kingdom to begin with, otherwise the tourism literature looks as though it is being distributed some wacky religious cult. They could have gone for ‘You only get one Fife - so make the most of it.’ ‘You only get out of Fife what you put into it’ or even ’Always Look on the Bright Side of Fife’. Hey, this is a good game. What fun these creatives must have.

Nearby Angus has gone for ‘Angus – birthplace of Scotland’ – a phrase wilfully obscure and presumably referring to the battle in 685AD between the Picts under King Bruide, and the invading Northumbrians, led by King Ecgfrith. This stopped the pesky southerners in the tracks and preserved a northern kingdom that eventually become Scotland. Apparently. The Battle of Nechtansmere or Dunnichen Moss took place near Forfar. The victorious King Bruide then gave his name to a local pie, used to fortify the Pictish warriors, thereafter called the Forfar Bruide or Bridie. (OK, I made that last bit up but, hey, who knows?)

Burghead on the Moray Firth, the old Pictish centre

Now where were we? Oh yes. You can also make a reference to a characteristic of the area – hence ‘Scottish Borders – Scotland’s leading short break destination’, though personally, I always think that suggests that there isn’t enough there for a longer holiday. (Not true.) I’d rather like to see ‘Aberlour – Scotland’s leading short bread destination’ as there’s a huge shortbread factory there in this pleasant little place on the River Spey.

Final piece of advice is: don’t be too clever or go for irony. I’m thinking here of the parallel with that Victorian Pears Soap ad which featured a grubby tramp writing a letter to Pears which read ‘Since using your soap three months ago, I have used none other.’ The last time that was tried in a tourism context was the exquisite ‘Banff and Buchan – that’s interesting’ from about twenty years ago. At least, I think they were trying to be ironic. Apparently, in a cupboard somewhere in a council office in Aberdeen, there are still to this day hundreds of mugs with this tag line printed on them. Don’t they know they could be collectors’ items?

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