Lancing Parish Council defends proposal to rebrand as Lancing-on-Sea

A design for lamppost banners aimed at boosting the village's profile was revealed last week, including controversial rebranding as Lancing-on-Sea.

The decision was met with criticism on a number of Facebook groups and commenters took to the Herald's Facebook page to air their views.

Clare Verlander described it as a 'misleading' waste of taxpayers' money, a sentiment echoed by Ruth Hinton and Neil Gardner who called it 'false advertising'.

Several people questioned where in the UK Lancing-on-Sea is located - "not on my maps," was Nicky Godfrey's response.

Yesterday (May 13), the logo made national headlines as the Telegraph covered reaction to the design.

The parish council has moved to explain the proposal, which was put forward by the affiliated Lancing Vision Group.

"It is disappointing that this suggestion has not been welcomed as anticipated, but it has created a great deal of conversation which is helpful given that this is a consultation and the parish council is all about listening too and acting on the community’s wishes," said a parish council spokesman.

"This idea stemmed from the results of a consultation carried out a couple of years ago. One of the suggestions was to make the village more ‘seasidey’, and as the name Lancing-on-Sea had been used previously to promote the village, the design incorporated that name to see how it would be reacted to.

"It was also to encourage additional footfall into the village centre to help those retailers who are only just surviving, but having just arrows pointing to the village centre wouldn’t be an attraction enough, so a Lancing ‘brand’ identity was needed.

"This is a project that the Parish Council is able to fulfil within its own remit, however, the Parish Council will continue to put pressure on other authorities to ensure Lancing does get its fair share of any regeneration funding that is available to fulfil the village’s other regeneration schemes.

"The Lancing Vision Group will meet again to examine the results of this survey so a decision can be made on the project’s future and will then submit a relevant recommendation to the Council."