The power of rebranding

The Millennium Dome, often referred to as The Dome, was originally constructed to celebrate the arrival of the third millennium in the year 2000. However within one year of construction, lack of foresight turned this iconic London project into a National failure as the dome lay uninhabitable until five years later when visionary rebranding changed its fortune far in excess of even its initial success.

The Dome is the largest structure of its type in the world (designed by Sir Richard Rogers and engineered by Buro Happold) and the project included the reclamation of the Greenwich Peninsula - land that was previously contaminated by toxic waste meaning that the regeneration works were seen as an investment to benefit the whole city.

In the mid 1990's, the original concept for the millenium development were designed  on a much smaller scale. In 1997 however, the incoming Labour government expanded the project size. Tony Blair claimed that the Dome would be "a triumph of confidence over cynicism, boldness over blandness, excellence over mediocrity". However even during the first year, it became clear that the project had been badly thought out and badly executed. The Dome / New Millenium Experience entered into Liquidation to the sum of £789 million.

In 2001 the site was sold to Anshutz who developed a plan for an entertainment complex with designers HOK SVE and the original project engineers, Buro Happold to a  cost of over £600 million.  As a key factor of this transition, Anschutz devised a complete rebranding of the project in association with O2 plc. The dome was publicly renamed The O2 Arena in May 2005, in a £6 million-per-year dea.

Today,  with a capacity of  23,000, it is one of the largest indoor arenas in Europe. It has become the ultimate award-winning venue for music, comedy, entertainment, sporting events, ice shows and national public celebrations. And despite being open for only seven months of the year, the venue In 2008 , exceeded sales of over 2 million, taking the crown as the ‘World's Busiest Arena’ from 7-times winners the MEN Arena, later featured in the Guinness World Records for the largest audience for a comedy show in 2008.  The awards continue to come as the arena was named 'World's Best Venue' by Pollstar in 2009 and "Live Music Venue of the Year" in 2010 London Lifestyle Awards.

And this year, this rebranded arena has received Britain’s highest accolade as it has been announced that it shall share in the hosting of the 2012 Summer Olympics.
 
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