Inspiring the next generation of digital talent at BIMA Digital Day 2026

On 10 November, Netcel returned to Parmiter’s School in Garston for BIMA Digital Day 2026, continuing our commitment to developing digital skills in young people. Lead Front End Engineer Allyn Thomas led the day for the sixth year, joined by Senior Client Partner Susie Rickard and Client Engagement Lead Ryan Connor. Together, the team spent the day with Year 10 students, guiding them through a real-world brief and giving them a taste of life inside a digital agency. 

What is BIMA Digital Day? 

Created by the British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) and sponsored this year by EPAM, Digital Day pairs digital agencies and tech companies with secondary schools across the UK. In 2026, digital professionals went into more than 100 schools to run hands-on workshops that open 11–16-year-olds’ eyes to the range of careers in digital, from strategy and design to development and data. 

“Six years on, I keep coming back to BIMA Day because the students’ fresh ideas, enthusiasm and dedication are really inspiring and gives me inspiration to do better in my own work. They keep adapting to what digital can make possible and are never held back by preconceived ideas of how technology or the world works today - they only think about how they can make things better.”

– Allyn Thomas, Lead Front End Engineer 

The 2026 challenge: Vue 

This year’s challenge partner was Vue, one of the leading cinema chains in the UK and Ireland, with 91 cinemas and almost 1,000 screens. The brief asked students a simple but tough question: how can digital ideas make Vue the cinema young people choose first, more often, and build longer-term loyalty to the brand? 

The brief pointed to why cinema matters to young audiences right now. It is one of the few places where phones go away, it is an affordable day out with friends, and the conversation carries on long after the credits roll, from rating films online to sharing clips on social media. 

Students chose one of three areas to focus on: 

• Club Vue – How could Vue’s app-based loyalty programme reward people for exploring, playing and sharing, not just for spending money? 

• Off-peak – How could Vue fill seats on quieter weekdays and during slower film release periods? 

• The cinema experience and app – How could Vue make the whole visit better, before, during and after the film? 

They also had to think about how people would hear about their idea, how Vue should “talk” to its audience, and how to reach younger people responsibly within the rules on marketing to under-18s. 

Discover, Design, Deliver 

To give students a realistic agency experience, the Netcel team structured the day around the same three steps we use to solve a client brief: 

1. Discover - Researching Vue, its competitors and wider industry trends to spot gaps in the market and understand the problems their audience faces. 
2. Design - Bringing the idea to life: what it does, how it looks and works, where it lives (an app, social media, a website or inside the cinema itself) and how it would be promoted. 
3. Deliver - Shaping a short, sharp five-minute pitch focused on what makes the idea unique and the value it brings to Vue and its customers. 

This year, we also talked about how agencies use AI day to day, from generating ideas and carrying out research to summarising information, checking quality and analysing numbers, and encouraged students to think about how AI could help their own work. Throughout, groups kept coming back to the brief: does the idea solve the problem, is it original, is it digital, and is it right for Vue? 

Closing of the day 

To finish, each group pitched their concept to a panel of Netcel team members and school staff. It was particularly interesting to see the creative ways groups set out to fill cinema seats at off-peak times. 

The winning group, OverVue (a play on Vue’s name), came up with a subscription and membership scheme that gamifies off-peak cinema trips, rewarding young people for going to the cinema at quieter times. Their idea has now been submitted to BIMA’s national competition, giving the students the chance to win individual prizes and £500 for their school. 

Looking ahead 

Twelve years on, BIMA Digital Day remains one of the highlights of Netcel’s calendar. It gives our people the chance to give something back, and gives young people a first-hand look at the careers that exist in digital and the skills they already have to succeed in them. 

To find out more about BIMA Digital Day and how your organisation can get involved, visit the BIMA website and help inspire the next generation of digital thinkers.