It is easy to treat all of that as a nice bit of publicity for tourism, but I think there is a much bigger point here. The way people perceive Hastings matters to the local economy.

I have worked in HR and recruitment in Hastings for more than 30 years, and during that time the town has changed enormously. We have some fantastic businesses here, including manufacturers and engineering companies operating internationally, alongside a growing number of smaller, creative and independent businesses. Yet one of the challenges Hastings has faced historically has been attracting and retaining the people those businesses need. Geography plays a part, transport plays a part, wages play a part, but perception matters too.

If you are trying to persuade an experienced engineer, manager, accountant or other skilled professional to move to the area, there is a considerable difference between having to defend Hastings and being able to point out that national publications are now telling their readers they ought to come here.

That matters because successful local economies don’t exist in isolation. Businesses need skilled people. Skilled people need homes, schools, restaurants, shops, culture and things to do. Those people spend money locally and start businesses of their own. Successful independent businesses make the town more attractive to visitors and potential residents, which creates further employment and investment. Done well, one part feeds another.

There are, of course, still very real challenges. Hastings has areas of deprivation, our transport links remain frustrating and the local employment market can be difficult for employers and candidates alike. We’ve written before about the difficulty local businesses are experiencing in finding reliable staff, and pretending those problems don’t exist wouldn’t help anybody. But neither should those challenges prevent us recognising the progress being made. In fact, improving the wider attractiveness and economic confidence of the town is part of how we address them.

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There is another side to this which I think sometimes gets overlooked. Hastings doesn’t need to become Brighton to succeed — and personally I rather hope it doesn’t. Part of the attraction is precisely that it has retained its own identity. We have the fishing fleet, the Old Town, the Stade, the pier, Hastings Contemporary and an extraordinary collection of independent businesses. We also have Jack in the Green, Hastings Bonfire, Pirate Day and the Seafood & Wine Festival — and, as I write this, we’re apparently preparing for Oktoberfest this weekend. Because in Hastings merely having a weekend isn’t sufficient reason to leave the house unless several thousand people can find an excuse to celebrate something and take over the town.

That combination of history, eccentricity, creativity and genuine economic activity is increasingly being noticed beyond the town . Time Out describes Hastings and St Leonards as having a “boatload of culture and brilliant eateries”, while its separate assessment of seaside destinations accessible from London placed Hastings and St Leonards above Brighton.

For employers, I think that changing reputation presents an opportunity. When recruiting people from outside East Sussex, sell the location as well as the job . Talk about the coast, the Old Town and St Leonards. Talk about what is happening here. If somebody has an outdated idea of Hastings based on a visit twenty years ago, encourage them to come down and spend a day here. The place they find may be rather different from the one they remember.

And for those of us already running businesses here, perhaps we should occasionally be a little better at talking the town up ourselves. There are plenty of things we can and should continue to challenge locally, but recognising Hastings’ successes doesn’t mean ignoring its problems. Confidence matters. Investment matters. New businesses matter. And creating somewhere talented people actively want to live and work is an important part of creating a stronger local employment market.

ASL has been part of the Hastings business community for decades and we recruit for businesses throughout Hastings, St Leonards, Bexhill and the wider East Sussex area. We see both the challenges and the opportunities in the local employment market every day. I’m therefore rather pleased to see the rest of the country beginning to notice something many of us have known for some time.

I’m still not entirely sure about “plucky” .

But “the south’s most exciting seaside town”?

We’ll take that.