Tourism and Collaboration

Tourism Swift Current Visitor and Convention Services Host, Jackie Moore, says the 49 x 110 Spring Conference April 23rd and 24th was a very well-attended two-day conference.

"It did exactly what we hoped it would accomplish," she says. "It brought together three sectors - tourism, economic development and private business. Some of our attendees, I'm very happy to say, we had the Town of Maple Creek, Gravelbourg, Leader, Shaunavon, Val Marie, Ogema. We had all the Saskatchewan Parks very well represented, people from the Grasslands, Cypress Hills, and of course, regional parks."

She added one of the great guest speakers was Cheng and Noy Lim from Maple Creek.

"They had just renovated the Commercial Hotel which is now an incredibly lovely heritage building and they were truly an amazing newcomer immigrant success story, when you look at what they accomplished and see all the help they had in the different people who came forward and helped them with the Commercial Hotel. Noy spoke very eloquently about now being part of a community and the importance of preserving our Saskatchewan heritage."

"Tourism Saskatchewan spoke about the creation of the event funding program, what qualifies, the guidelines of the program. They spoke about what their mission and vision is and all about marketing Saskatchewan experiences. We had great speakers, a great opportunity for everyone to network, and we had a really great time. Everyone came away from the conference feeling like they had learned a great deal and exchanged a lot of information, so we were very pleased with how it went."

Jackie says they generally get a different cross-section of people coming out to all of the conferences, but definitely the numbers were greater this year.

"It's very encouraging, because we are getting great momentum. It is our fourth annual and people are seeing the wealth of information they take away from it."

One surprise from the conference was how well everyone embraced the idea of collaboration.

At the conference, she says,"everyone is very involved in their own area and their tourism venues and what they need to market and Sandra Blyth spoke very well about strategic growth and what is made possible by collaborative efforts and she gave some great examples. When I spoke to people throughout the conference, they spoke very positively about the need, ability and willingness to go and collaborate with other areas because there's a great return with strength in numbers."