WHEN it comes to the best places to work, our town is a top 10 hit.
Bolton has been named the ninth best place in the country for workers by Glassdoor, one of the world’s largest job sites.
It published its 25 best places to live by ranking the UK’s towns and cities on three criteria — how easy it is to find a job, how affordable it is to live there and overall job satisfaction.
The result comes just weeks after Bolton was branded a 'nothing of a town' in a Guardian newspaper article.
A social media campaign entitled #ReasonsILoveBolton was launched to hit back at criticism and show what is good about the town.
Sarah Longlands, who lives in Heaton, started the campaign with her friends and was happy to see more positive publicity.
She said: "It is really good news. I suppose it just really confirms our suspicions that Bolton is not as bad as everyone makes out.
"I think a lot of the negative feeling about Bolton comes from the town centre but there is so much more to the town.
"I think Manchester is booming at the moment so Bolton is going to get some of the benefits of that.
"I have friends who don't want to live in Manchester but if you live in Bolton you are close to Manchester for work and if you want to go out.
"You are close to the Pennines, you can have the best of both worlds."
She added that they have been amazed by the response to the campaign and now hope to get out on the streets and talk to people, as well as finding out what the exact plans are to redevelop Bolton town centre.
Bolton has seen off competition from Birmingham — often referred to as the country’s second city — the prestigious university town of Oxford and Northern Ireland’s capital city, Belfast, in being named in the top 10.
Bolton also outranks some of the country’s biggest cities including Bristol, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Nottingham.
Leader of Bolton Council, Cllr Cliff Morris, hailed the findings but said they came as no surprise to him.
He said: "This study confirms what we in Bolton already know, that it is a great town to live and work in.
“To feature so high up on a list ahead of a lot of other large towns and cities speaks volumes.
“Our largest employment site is Logistics North, which is the biggest development of its kind in the north of England and home to the distribution hubs of major employers such as Aldi and Lidl.
“The regeneration of Bolton town centre is also well under way with developments such as the £27m Market Place refurbishment which has attracted new businesses and restaurants.
He continued: “Bolton is also perfectly situated for commuters to Manchester with our new £48m transport interchange. Bolton is just 12 minutes on the train to Manchester and an affordable place to live.
“Our recently-unveiled £1billion plan for the town centre will facilitate the redevelopment and growth of our town and will help to make us a more desirable town to live and work in.
To arrive at its final list, Glassdoor took into account each town or city’s median-average pay for employees, current average home value, overall job satisfaction rating, population and number of current job openings.
Bolton scored 3.6 out of a possible 5, with the job site giant finding there were 11,233 job openings, a median-average salary of £21,000 and a job satisfaction rating among employees of 3.3 out of 5.
The median home value in the town, according to Glassdoor, is £159,690.
Slough, in Berkshire — the town immortalised in Ricky Gervais’ comedy The Office — was named the best place to live in the UK, followed by Manchester, Cambridge, Swindon and Stoke-on-Trent.
The full list is:
1 Slough
2 Manchester
3 Cambridge
4 Swindon
5 Stoke-on-Trent
6 Reading
7 Leeds
8 Milton Keynes
9 Bolton
10 Oxford
11 Coventry
12 Derby
13 Nottingham
14 Birmingham
15 Ipswich
16 Belfast
17 Southampton
18 Aberdeen
19 Luton
20 Dundee
21 Newcastle-upon-Tyne
22 Bristol
23 Blackpool
24 Hull
25 Peterborough
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