North East Automotive Alliance (NEAA)

Background

The North East Automotive Alliance (NEAA) champions the automotive sector in North East England. An industry-led automotive cluster, it supports the economic growth and competitiveness of the sector, and helps its members make business connections whilst supporting collaboration.

It is also the largest automotive cluster in the UK, with over 270 cluster participants, and is one of the fastest-growing clusters across Europe. Its members include OEMs, and tier 1, 2 and 3 suppliers as well as service providers.

Brief

We were commissioned by the NEAA to develop a branding, messaging and communications toolkit, to support a pilot campaign to assist long-term unemployed residents in South Tyneside, secure entry-level roles – and increase the attractiveness of the advanced manufacturing industry.

The project, funded by the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UK SPF), aimed to get unemployed or NEET (Not in Education, Employment or Training) South Tyneside residents into entry-level automotive jobs to address significant worker shortages. It also aimed to support additional people to access a vocational skills pathway leading to employment in advanced manufacturing. In addition to this, the campaign was aimed at raising the attractiveness of the advanced manufacturing and automotive sector.

The project needed a range of communications assets which could be employed by the North East Automotive Alliance and organisations responsible for delivering the pilot, including Quartz Future, Positive About Inclusion and the Foundation of Light, based at Sunderland AFC.

Solution

• We created an identity for the initiative, centred around persuading South Tyneside residents that they could ‘Make it’ in advanced manufacturing in their local area, and shaped a distinct tone of voice and messaging suite for the campaign.
• We captured the career journeys and experiences of employees working in the sector, through creating engaging video, visual and written content – and worked closely with some of North East England’s most high profile employers, including Nissan, Unipres, Mangan Exteriors and Highly Marelli, to achieve this. It was vital that employee case studies were relatable, and would resonate with young people and long-term unemployed residents.
• We created a landing page on the NEAA website, to act as a hub for the pilot project, with information on events, resources and sector benefits.
• A slide deck, animations, infographics, blogs and social media assets were also created to highlight the advantages of a career in advanced manufacturing – and bring the sector to life.
• Our team drew on Horizon Work’s experience of working in the manufacturing sector, and our links to automotive, subsea engineering and aerospace firms in the region, to create compelling content for the toolkit.

Results

• The communications toolkit was successfully used by multiple partners in the project to drive traffic to the campaign landing page, underscore social media and digital advertising campaigns, attract attendees to an Advanced Manufacturing Careers Fair in March 2025, and engage with education providers.
• Following the pilot, the NEAA will be using the assets from the communications toolkit to support further engagement with schools and colleges around STEM education.