Best in the West Awards 2024

At the 2024 Conference the following Best in the West Awards were announced. Submissions for each is available.

Events and Marketing

HollyDaze

Designed to kick off the holiday season, HollyDaze had explosive growth from 1,000 people in its first year to 12,000 in its second. This was achieved through solid relationship building with the municipality and impressive movement forward with merchant buy-in. The committee was further impressed by the excellent benchmarking data and evaluation metrics. These will set a solid foundation for future events.

Downtown Courtenay Poetry Walk

Capitalizing on the 2023 National Poetry Month and its theme of JOY, Downtown Courtenay partnered with a local poetry organization and visial artist. The goal was to find a positive counterpoint to increasing street disorder in the district. The committee appreciated the innovative apporach to this issue. The growth in participation from the first year to the planned second year is an impressive indication of success where specific KPIs are hard to measure. The committee further liked the relationship building between businesses and the arts, the affordability of the event and how easy it would be to replicate in other jurisdictions.

Fork and Finger

An event to provide an affordable introduction to the district's many restaurants. $5 and $10 take-out samplers provided a quick introduction to the restaurants. A passport system encouraged full participation and captured valuable information for future marketing for both the BIA and the restaurants. An impressive 58.5% return rate indicates a highly successful event. The submission illustrated impressive performance against their KPIs, is sustainable in its simplicty and is highly repicable for other BIAs.