TY - JOUR AB - Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to report on a special session entitled “Place branding: Are we wasting our time?”, held at the American Marketing Association’s Summer Marketing Educators’ conference in 2014. Design/methodology/approach– The report details the outcome of an Oxford-style debate with two opposing teams of two persons – one team supporting and one team opposing the motion. The opening speaker of each team had 10 minutes to put their case across, and the closing speaker had 8 minutes. Teams took to the stand alternately, matching up against each other’s arguments. Findings– The outcome of the debate points towards a need for place brands to develop as more inclusive and organic entities, in which case it may be best for place practitioners to avoid creating and imposing a place brand and instead help shape it from the views of stakeholder constituencies. This shifts the notion of place branding towards an activity centred on “curation”. Originality/value– The use of a competitive debating format as a means for exploring academic ideas and concepts in the place management field. VL - 8 IS - 1 SN - 1753-8335 DO - 10.1108/JPMD-12-2014-0028 UR - https://doi.org/10.1108/JPMD-12-2014-0028 AU - Medway Dominic AU - Swanson Kathryn AU - Delpy Neirotti Lisa AU - Pasquinelli Cecilia AU - Zenker Sebastian PY - 2015 Y1 - 2015/01/01 TI - Place branding: are we wasting our time? Report of an AMA special session T2 - Journal of Place Management and Development PB - Emerald Group Publishing Limited SP - 63 EP - 68 Y2 - 2024/03/19 ER -