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40 To u r i s m N a n ai m o B C B U S I N E S S . C A A P R I L / M AY 2 0 2 5 BEST CITIES FOR WORK THE JUST VISITING? Tourism Nanaimo recently launched an aggressive, colourful campaign called "Nanaimo Normal" that puts the spotlight on the city's character, embracing some of the rough-around-the-edges reputation that has bogged down the city for years and trying to repurpose it in an eclectic way. "I used to come to Nanaimo as a kid, and I had that old Vancouver Island per- spective of it—dirty, gritty, not a place you want to go," says Angela Caparelli, opera- tions manager for Tourism Nanaimo. "But in the past few years, it's become the dia- mond in the rough of the Island. No one expects to find what they find here. It's a beautiful little city." The new brand efforts have accentuated that image, says Emma Wassmer, market- ing director of Tourism Nanaimo. "It's given us that voice to go for it—to dive into this vibrant, beautiful community. We're bright, colourful, unapologetically our- selves. You can be who you are here, and everybody's welcome." One of the city's main downtown thoroughfares, Commercial Street, is currently under construction. Some of it was necessary—a water main needed replacing—but the city decided to add in other improvements, like flattened curbs and improved lighting. "Even with the closures, the positivity of wanting to support local is there," says Wassmer. "The street is closed but the businesses are still open. We've been see- ing the community come together and sup- port them." Morgane Riddell, who manages the vis- itor's centre—which last year moved into a large location in the Vancouver Island Con- ference Centre—agrees: "The whole city is like that. Each business helps the commu- nity. They're always giving back and that's what we want to reflect in our brand." CONFERENCE CALLS The conference centre and its almost 40,000 square feet of space is key for bring- ing in out-of-towners as Nanaimo tries to position itself as a business hub. To that end, a key recent hire for the city has been Gina Bethel, who joined Tourism Nanaimo in 2022 for the newly created role of busi- ness development manager of meetings, conferences and sport. Much of Bethel's job is in bringing large, multi-day or national conferences to the city, either at the conference centre or at the Coast Bastion Hotel, which has a confer- ence space for smaller groups. She's been busy—the conference schedule is close to fully booked up for the next two years. "Some people think nothing happens in Nanaimo; they think the conference centre is a white elephant. But they have nothing to back that up," says Bethel. "When [the conference centre] was built 15 years ago there was a referendum—52 percent of voters said yes. A lot of people want to see it fail and don't understand the benefit of conferences and meetings." In 2017, voters roundly defeated a pro- posal for a new $80-million events centre that would have included a hockey arena, a decision that was largely seen as a rejection of the then-council. "For so long, conferences always went to Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa. Smaller cities didn't have the capa- bility," says Bethel. "Now there's places like Nanaimo, Kelowna, Lethbridge. Those places are now saying, 'We have flexibility, we're outside the box, we're cheaper than those other destinations. You can get to us easily.'" That last part is in no small way buoyed by the creation of Hullo Ferries, which was launched in August 2023 and takes pas- sengers directly between Vancouver and Nanaimo for about $40 each way. Rides typically last 70 minutes. Hullo, run by the Vancouver Island Ferry Co., was privately financed by Toronto-based Conqora Cap- ital Partners and international investor InfraRed Capital Partners, in partnership with the Port Authority of Nanaimo and the Snuneymuxw First Nation, who are also majority owners of the city's new Court- yard by Marriott hotel. "The convention centre, that's a better facility than Victoria or Penticton have, but we've never been thought of as a confer- ence destination because we don't have enough hotel rooms. Now we do," says David McQuinn, general manager of the Coast Bastion Hotel, Nanaimo's largest,

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