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This paper examines the mental associations of a city brand - that of the Hungarian city Nagykanizsa located in West-Hungary. These associations were collected among young people attending high school in the city (Generation Z). The research is motivated by the high percent of local young people leaving the city after finishing their high school education. Students from six secondary schools in Nagykanizsa were asked to give their opinion and their associations about the city in the questionnaire. In free associations, most respondents named the infrastructure and the local attractions, while in the guided association young people described the city as "beautiful", "boring" and "small". In both cases, negative associations had a slight majority, which showed the dual character of the evoked associations: a beautiful, renovated, clean city was contrasted with the city image of a dirty, empty town with no interesting programs. When comparing the city brand to car brands, the three car brands mentioned most times were Trabant, Suzuki and Lada, suggesting that young people do not regard Nagykanizsa as a modern, dynamic settlement. Comparing the city brand to animals, the results were similar: most compared the city to a sloth describing a settlement with slow and idle development. At the end of the paper, recommendations are formulated based on the results to show how to improve the liveability of the city and how to increase identification and attachment to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]