Co-op Live: How Manchester’s new icon turned into a national joke

For the last few years the building that was to become Co-op Live has been slowing emerging from the building site lying in the shadow of Manchester City‘s Etihad Stadium. Clearly visible from the lines serving the city’s main train station, you’d be hard pressed not to be aware that something major was being constructed.

The arena is owned through a joint venture between OVG and City Football Group and also counts a list of smaller investors including Harry Styles, Simon Moran and Denis Desmond. US giant OVG is run by Tim Leiweke, the man who helped convince David Beckham to sign for LA Galaxy, while City Football Group needs no introduction. Both organisations have been working hard to control the PR narrative ever since the first CGIs were released to the public before planning permission was ever granted by Manchester City Council.

For the most part they have done a fantastic job. There has been very little bad press about budget increases and from when the £365m arena was first delayed as construction dragged on – not helped by post-Covid difficulties and cost rises.

Stuttering Co-op Live hits the headlines

Co-op Live was originally supposed to open to the public in December 2023 but was delayed until April this year, and then of course, a few times after that. What’s supposed to happen with a launch like this is that the opening gets into the national headlines and then everything calms down and it quickly becomes a popular and well thought of addition to a city.

While it’s a big deal for a city like Manchester to get its second major indoor area, the largest in the country now, it’s typically not a story that would linger in the national headlines for as many days as it has done now. Words like calamitous, tumultuous and chaotic are now being used before and after the name Co-op Live – which you’d be safe in saying would be considered to be sub-par to OVG, City Football Group and indeed The Co-op.

The Co-op‘s 15-year naming rights deal is reportedly worth just shy of £100m and you can bet they are far from pleased with the continued negative headlines the situation is generating. To put this in context, Co-op Live would never have been the subject of a BBC News breaking news notification if the story had been going to plan.

Losing your arena boss ahead of the planned first gig because of some very unwise comments about regional venues was also, obviously, not ideal. With every new delay, with every frustrated fan being turned away, Co-op Live’s problems are mounting and the challenge of turning the narrative around is becoming ever more tricky.

How does Co-op live turn things around?

Well the first thing to do, clearly, is actually get a gig to happen. Once the music starts, the negative headlines will start to dissipate. But they won’t totally disappear – trust has been broken, and people will continue to worry that their expensive concert tickets won’t be honoured with an actual event.

The bosses at Co-op Live need to take back control of the narrative and shout about what the arena is one of the most exciting projects the North West has seen in some time. There is an awful lot of development going on in the likes of Manchester and Liverpool at the moment, with even more planned for the coming years. Manchester’s skyline has been transformed since I moved to the city in 2012 and there is no sign that things are going to slow down any time soon.

Co-op Live, though, isn’t just another massive skyscraper that the vast majority of people in the city are not going to go inside. Rather, it’s a physical statement of intent that the city is here to take on London as a major draw for the biggest artists in the world. Co-op Live also has a decent story to tell about its green credentials and how it’s contributing to the regeneration of that area of Manchester.

The negativity will die down over time but it’s also fair to say that this troubled launch will live long in the memory and will continue to be a topic of conversation for some time to come. Co-op Live has already made a positive economic difference to Manchester during the construction period – it just needs to start doing so while actually putting on entertainment for a paying public. Will it stop people buying tickets for gigs over the next few months and years? No. But will it go down as one of the worst launches of a major public building in the country? Yes.

Jon Robinson is City A.M.’s UK Editor