Month: February 2026

Visitors, residents and businesses in Bury St Edmunds town centre will be celebrating both the Artemis II Moon Rocket Mission and football’s World Cup this year with two free activity trails.  In each of the trails, participants will have a chance to win a variety of prizes. 

The first trail will be astronomy themed to celebrate the Artemis II mission, currently scheduled to launch this spring.  Town centre businesses are invited to get involved with the trails by displaying a poster and an item (which will be supplied by the organisers) in their shop window, which participants then seek out and record on the official entry form for the competition.  The trails are being co-ordinated by Our Bury St Edmunds BID (Business Improvement District).

Chief Executive of Our Bury St Edmunds BID Mark Cordell said: “It’s incredible to think that we did our first trail in 2011 and they just go from strength to strength – last year we had the best take-up ever of businesses wanting to be part of our trails and I hope even more will sign up this year.

“With the interest in both the first crewed mission to the moon in more than 50 years and the World Cup – where we are also commemorating the fact that it is the 60^th anniversary of that historic 1966 win – this is the perfect family activity.  It’s an opportunity to visit different parts of the town centre and can be done over a number of days.”  

Both trails will run over a number of weeks and each will also include one of the town centre’s major annual events.  The astronomy-themed trail supported by the Bury St Edmunds Astronomy Association will run from the end of March to the end of May. Visitors to the Our Bury St Edmunds Spring Fayre on May 24 and 25 will be able to visit astronomy workshops for further inspiration.  The World Cup trail will run through the school summer holidays including during the Our Bury St Edmunds Food & Drink Festival over the August Bank Holiday weekend.

There is still time for BID member businesses to register their interest in featuring on one or both of the trails and those interested in doing so should contact the Our Bury St Edmunds BID team in the usual way.

Shoppers in Bury St Edmunds have once again given an overwhelming vote of approval to the Our Bury St Edmunds BID-supported Town Centre Gift Card, which saw sales almost double during 2025.  During the year almost £50,000 was spent purchasing cards for gifts – and additionally the amount spent by those using their gift cards in local businesses was up by around 20% on the previous year.

November and December saw the highest amount spent on purchasing the cards – which is now accepted by 85 town centre businesses.  More than £30,000 – a 50% increase on 2024 – was spent buying Bury St Edmunds Gift Cards in the run up to Christmas, which, it’s anticipated, will give a boost to the local economy when recipients start spending it in early 2026.

The upsurge in gift card purchases has come as no surprise to Our Bury St Edmunds BID’s Business Support Manager Mike Kirkham.  He said: “The increasing popularity, both among purchasers and businesses that accept it, is down to a number of reasons. Customers love the variety of retail, food and drink, leisure and wellbeing options that it gives – including both independents and high street names.  We know that the desire to ‘Shop Local’ is important to many in Bury St Edmunds and this is a great way to do so, but best of all it’s really easy to purchase or use and backed by well-known and trusted brands as you would expect from Our Bury St Edmunds.

“In addition, the Bury St Edmunds Gift Card is part of the multi-award winning Town & City Gift Cards initiative powered by Miconex. Operating on the Mastercard network and managed securely through local stockists, the card provides customers with a safe, reliable way to support our businesses, whether purchasing online or in-person.”

As well as the increase in sales of the card ahead of Christmas, there was also a 40% increase in spending on the card in the same two months compared to last year with £10,000 ringing through town centre tills.

Mike Kikham added: “This is the first full year that we have also offered the option of a digital card which accounted for just over 10 per cent of the purchases – and I expect that to grow.  However, the most popular way to gift the card was by picking it up at one of the nine stockists in the town centre and loading the amount to give straight onto it.”

Bulk purchases of the gift card can also be made by businesses looking to reward staff or to tie in with their own projects and initiatives. Sales of the card in this way have also increased by 50% in the last year.  A full list of where to spend the card or how to purchase it can be found at www.ourburystedmunds.com.