With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1515520
13 B C B U S I N E S S . C A M A R C H 2 0 24 G o F i g u r e : i S t o c k /s t y l e - p h o t o g r a p h y, A d o b e S t o c k / O l e h , i S t o c k / b s d s t u d i o Restaurant owners, for ex- ample, can expect an influx of reservations, but must ensure they have the staff to pull it off (and they might want to brush up on the provincial rules around overtime work). "Do you have a reliable temporary work pool? Do you understand the legislation around labour relations? If you don't have staff that know how to run the point-of-sale system or what's on the menu, if you don't have clean bathrooms—all of that makes up the guest experi- ence," says Westcott. At the downtown Seattle spot where my sister and I grabbed lunch, the servers understood that the major- ity of diners that day were following a strict timeline. No matter how delicious a meal is, visitors won't tolerate waiting too long for a bill when there's a $50 T-shirt line to get to. 150,000-ish people earned a seat at the Eras Tour in Van- couver—but millions more are left with "waitlist" status and teardrops on their guitars. "Businesses can capitalize on folks that are on the waiting list, and create some kind of com- munity around that," suggests Westcott. For example, a bar might host a Taylor Swift night and offer discounted tickets to anyone on the waitlist. It might not be the hottest ticket in town, but it's better than nothing. EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED "If you are tangential to the tourism industry and you don't already know it, now is a good time to recognize it," says Westcott. Thanks to the new phenomenon of going all-in on concert outfits (see: the spike in metallic bodysuit pur- chases when Beyoncé brought Renaissance to Vancouver or the bald-cap boom when Pitbull came to town), 'tis the damn season to prepare your clothing or beauty retail biz for Taylor. And thanks to the diversity of the Eras them- selves—shimmery gold for Fearless, ethereal and woodsy for evermore, badass snakeskin for Reputation, et cetera—noth- ing's out of style. And with that comes more service opportunities: we'll need sewers to hem sequined pants and drycleaners to tackle delicate lavender gowns. "Swift- ies are just on another level," says Westcott. "If you can lean into that Swiftie culture and do it in a cute or cheeky or clever way, I think businesses could see an immediate bump up." Art studios could host Taylor- themed paint nights. Drag performers could embrace the lavender haze. But once Taylor leaves, savvy marketers won't be out of the woods. "How do you turn that into a longer-term strategy?" asks Westcott. "Take the momentum from those fun, shorter-term creative things and use them to forward your business." Translating your tactics from this one-time event into a sustainable plan is what will set your biz apart from the rest—so think about the end game. YOU NEED TO CALM DOWN Back to December. There are hundreds of thousands of people with millions of dollars to spend coming to the city for just three nights. Regardless of how many Swift songs made it onto your Spotify Wrapped list (mine was 4/5—Olivia Rodrigo squeaked in at fifth place), the pressure is on to mastermind a marketing plan that makes the most of her arrival. Where do you start? Westcott suggests turning to the experts, like Destination Vancouver, Destination BC, BIAs and hotel associations. "Indus- try groups are the ones that are really going to be able to set strategic direction, but also help businesses understand their part in it," she explains. That said, the most valuable experts might be closer than you think. "Customer research does not have to be this hard, expensive, sophisticated thing," says Westcott. "Where are the Swifties on your team?" She suggests simply reaching out to the diehard fans around you— the ones who know Taylor Swift all too well. (This is basically what our editor-in-chief did when assigning this story, so I can confirm that it works.) "Ask the people you know what kinds of things they would want to see, what kinds of touches would really make them feel that coming to your business is part of this experi- ence," says Westcott. If you have an idea, speak now. Organizations voicing support included the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, B.C. Golf and the Vancouver Airport Authority (with the caveat that the change be made in concert with America's West Coast states) SOURCES: GOVERNMENT OF B.C., CBC, NASDAQ, NPR, UBC Approximately 70 countries around the world observe some form of DST, including most of Europe Major exceptions: China, India and Japan A 2014 study by the University of Colorado at Boulder linked a 17 percent increase in traffic fatalities to sleep deprivation caused by springing ahead of 223,273 respondents to a B.C. government survey in 2019 favoured adopting DST year-round 93 %