Forming the tourist brand of Donetsk: history, problems and prospects

The article actualizes and substantiates the priority of branding in the modern world and in the post-Soviet space. The authors consider the historiography of the problem under by the example of the city of Donetsk. Emerged at the end of the nineteenth century as a workers’ village near the factory, in the Soviet era Donetsk was formed as the largest industrial center of the metallurgical and mining industry, the “All-Union stokehold”. In a city with a population of a million, located in the steppe zone, much attention was paid to building green, creating recreational areas. In the 70th of the twentieth century, Donetsk became known as the “city of a million roses”. With the collapse of the Soviet Union in the city were processes of business formation, redistribution of spheres of influence, accompanied by criminal disassembly. In the 21st century, city authorities tried to form a positive investment climate, the first attempts were made to form a tourist image of the city. An important stimulus to these processes was the holding in the city of the final part of the European Football Championship in 2012. On the eve of this event, work on branding has sharply increased. Foreign specialists were involved, and various options were developed. The official picture was a schematic depiction of coal and rose as a combination of strength and beauty. The work continued after this sport event. The program “Donetsk 365” was designed to attract visitors and tourists to the city all the year round by organizing various events. The military-political confrontation between Ukraine and the Donbas, which began in 2014 sharply, slowed down this process. However, new symbols appeared: Donetsk airport, Sparta, Givi. The article presents the results of the study of public opinion on the problem of the tourist brand of Donetsk from 2012 to 2017. The study involved 1654 people aged 16 to 48 years. Most respondents considers the brand and professionally formed slogan “Strength and Beauty”, which are coal and roses. The formation of the brand process is complex and multistage. It is necessary to take into account a whole complex of social, political, economic, economic, psychological, cultural and historical factors. Priority is given to financial investments in the process of brand formation, which in the future will pay off due to the formation of a tourist destination.