A community app created by a Cheshire tech entrepreneur is being snapped up in other areas of the country following its success in Chester.
Rob Meakin, Managing Director of Chester based IT business Loyalty Pro, designed the One-Chester app to help support the digitisation of the city.
The app, the most comprehensive community app available in any city in the UK, has a searchable directory of over 2,200 shops, service businesses, points of interest and visitor attractions.
Not limited to commercial sites, it also includes foodbanks, public toilets, local government and university buildings too to make it as easy as possible for anyone visiting Chester to find what they are looking for.
Since it was launched in Chester in Spring 2024, the app has been rolled out to CH1, CH2, CH3 and CH4 venues, and businesses in satellite villages such as Farndon have been added to the database. Each site has a description, a website link and an interactive map as well as a “what3words” location making it simple for visitors to search.
A new comprehensive events calendar shows all the major events happening in the city and, this autumn, venues will be given access to the portal to add their own events and offers.
Rob, who lives near Chester and first trialled a community app in Hoole in 2018, said: “The One-Chester app is a major step in the push to make Chester a truly digital city.
“Over 2,000 local businesses are profiled in a digital “Yellow Pages” together with their directions, offers and events.
“The directory can be searched and filtered by business name, category, street name, district or postcode, with results displayed in lists or as a map.
“The app also includes points of interest and community services such as foodbanks, public toilets, ATMs and interactive trails. It contains everything needed for a trip to the area for locals and visitors alike.
“As well as redesigning the look of the app to make it faster and easier to use and to find relevant offers, we’ve added the ability to choose your favourite venues and add to personalised maps and lists.
“We’ve also created numerous shareable public lists, for example: dog friendly venues, remote working sites, bottomless brunch sites and live music venues. People can now share their own favourites too.
“We have also added the ability for local clubs to use the app as a virtual membership card to save them having to print physical ones.
“The app is free to download and all businesses with physical premises in the Chester area are entitled to a free listing. There’s significant cost involved for us to maintain the listings, so any business or individual interested in sponsoring us in return for more exposure on the app is very welcome to get in touch.”
“We’re delighted that the app has tripled its user base in the city with hardly any marketing spend and no support from the council or the Chester BID.
“The addition of an Events calendar to the One-Chester app is a major step which will empower the venues to help us provide a single comprehensive and up-to-date event calendar, something that the city has needed for a long time.”
When the team at Destination Cranleigh, a Business Improvement District (BID) in Surrey, heard about the One-Chester app they asked Rob to create a version of the app for them.
Rob said: “They read about us and got in touch just as we were looking for a second location with a better digital 4g/5g/Wi-Fi infrastructure than we have in Chester. A better signal means we can offer more of our proximity-based innovations.
“Cranleigh is known as “the largest village in England”, with a vibrant community and a progressive business improvement district team who had already implemented community high street Wi-Fi. It made it an ideal place for us to implement our latest enhancements and ideas.
“It took just 12 weeks for us to set them up and their version went live at the start of July. They’ve had a great response with over 600 locals using the app after just a few weeks.
“They wanted their app to include points for shopping local at all participating businesses, with loyalty rewards provided by the BID based on the number of visits made. We implemented this from day one via a unique QR code within each store.
“We are about to launch a new secure web portal for them which will allow businesses to update their own profiles, events and offers. This will ensure the app info is always bang up to date and relevant for the community users.”
Christine Martin, General Manager of Destination Cranleigh BID, said: “We were looking to take our shop local marketing initiative to a new level with a community loyalty app. Partnering with Loyalty Pro has made this happen in a really short timeframe.”
Rob added: “Our plan is to test our innovations in Cranleigh and implement them in Chester right after they’re proven, hence our Chester app community can look forward to getting more exciting new features in the coming months.”
If you’re interested in finding out more about the app or you’re a business interested in expanding your profile, please contact: rob.meakin@loyaltypro.co.uk
