Denise Blashko, executive director with the South Okanagan Chamber of Commerce, was guest speaker at the Rotary Club of Osoyoos recently. (Richard McGuire photo)
Denise Blashko had just started her new position as executive director of the South Okanagan Chamber of Commerce (SOCC) in September when she was immediately thrust into helping with a major event, Festival of the Grape.
In less than three months on the job, she’s helped with business walks in Oliver and Osoyoos, a new chamber event called Harvesting Diversity and now she’s preparing for the SOCC’s annual general meeting (AGM) and awards night in January.
Blashko gave a wide-ranging talk recently as guest speaker at the Rotary Club of Osoyoos where she talked about her experience so far, the role and goals of the SOCC and about business promotion and development more generally.
The AGM and awards night is set for Jan. 22, but the location has not yet been finalized, Blashko said.
A call for nominations for the business excellence awards will be going out shortly and the public will be invited to nominate businesses in the three major categories from past years: Small Business Excellence, Large Business Excellence and Entrepreneur of the Year.
This year there will be a new fourth category, Customer Service Excellence, which replaces last year’s new category of Best Workplace Environment, Blashko said.
Blashko is originally from Manitoba, but she spent much of her career in business and community development roles in Central Alberta. Her most recent position was with Community Futures based in Penticton – a job where she also served residents across the Okanagan-Similkameen area.
Despite working in such larger cities as Edmonton, Vancouver, Richmond and Winnipeg, Blashko told the Rotarians she never hung out in the big cities and instead nurtured her “affinity and passion” for small towns.
“I would have this adventure jar that was filled with names of all the rural towns near to the big city where I was living,” she said. “Each Saturday I would just pull out where I was going and explore the downtown, the ethnicity, what’s going on in the towns and what’s their story.”
She would draw a name like Two Hills and have to find it on an Alberta map – it’s east of Edmonton – and drive there to explore it for the day.
“I found it fascinating how some towns were boarded up and quiet and other towns just had energy that was amazing, even if you had to actually open the doors and go behind the façade of the downtown core,” she said.
What factors make one town successful and another not?
“It seems to be that you have a handful of really motivated and action-oriented people that just have the love of their community,” she said. “They just created the momentum that had people wanting to come on board and get engaged.”
A strong mayor and council and groups working together collaboratively were other factors. Community cohesiveness, she said, was often a bigger factor than geography.
Blashko said in her first two months with the SOCC, she has been able to connect with many businesses, the municipalities and organizations such as Destination Osoyoos and she sees those necessary ingredients in the South Okanagan.
“There’s lots of passion for making our communities better and openness too to working together,” she said.
In the business walks in Osoyoos and Oliver that took place during Small Business Week in October, Blashko said she heard a few common themes.
In Osoyoos, some people mentioned the need for better signage to tell people the stores are there and that they are open, she said.
Some merchants mentioned problems with shoplifting and thefts, while some called for expanding the downtown area and making improvements outside the main core.
In Oliver, a theme that came up was the shortage of hotel accommodation. This was particularly an issue during Festival of the Grape in Oliver when people were sent to Osoyoos to find hotels and sometimes had to go back up to Penticton and Kelowna.
Some Rotary members questioned Blashko about the percentage of businesses that belong to the chamber. She said it’s around 30 per cent in Osoyoos and Oliver and slightly higher in Okanagan Falls.
Blashko said that times have changed across Canada and chambers of commerce must reinvent themselves to meet present conditions. Often businesses are choosing to belong to associations specific to their industry instead, she noted.
The chamber has a chance to reach out for new members in some of the micro and small businesses such as home-based enterprises and consultants, she said.
“I think there’s a lot of people out there that would like to belong to a group,” she said. “It doesn’t have to be a big store to get value out of belonging to the chamber. Those smaller businesses really benefit from coming on board.”
Besides promoting business and encouraging people to shop locally, the SOCC provides other benefits such as group health insurance, training, and assistance with processes such as registering a name or forming a company.
The chamber also holds regular business networking events hosted by local businesses.
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
