The Chilliwack Economic Recovery Network (CERN) is a collaborative effort to support our community through economic benefits aimed at small business as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. CERN partners include the City of Chilliwack, Chilliwack Economic Partners Corporation, Chilliwack Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Chilliwack Business Improvement Association, Community Futures South Fraser, Sto:lo Community Futures, and Tourism Chilliwack.
Shop Local CHWK/Shop, Scan, Win was innovative and engaging with elements of the campaign that were free and accessible to everyone in the community. There were 160 businesses participating in Shop, Scan and Win. Each business was provided with a unique QR code that they shared with their customers every time a local purchase was made. This allowed the customer to enter an email or phone number to be entered to win fabulous weekly prizes.
Five festively wrapped mailboxes distributed throughout our community were creative, fun, and engaging and we were able to create a lot of excitement by having our elves and the grinch out and about at the mailboxes at peak shopping times encouraging letter writing to our local elves. Each week, our elves, Holly and Dolly, also drew winners for weekly prizes.
Each participating location in Shop Local received a one minute, professionally produced video that showcased the owner of the business stating who they were, why shopping local is important and highlighting a few of their favorite products. With the high level of engagement on social media, this helped inform our community of who our local businesses are and what the support of the community means to them. We reached new audiences by including the products. Citizens in our community learned about new businesses and new products.
In January, our mailboxes changed to Fun Fridays where we chose three participating businesses to engage in a social media contest helping businesses to gain more followers while also purchasing gift cards from them for the give away.
All prizes (valued over $100,000) were purchased from participating local businesses.
Funding in the amount of $106,000 was made possible through the Government of Canada's Strategic Activities Program, administered by the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, and delivered through the BC Chamber of Commerce.
This project was hugely successful in many ways including:
Number of local partnerships created: 10
Number of resources developed:
o 161 promotional videos
o 5 community mailboxes
o 5,000 branded shopping bags
o Website with full directory and gallery
o Christmas lights for future use
Social media impressions: 800,000
Number of participating businesses: 160
Number of local suppliers that received funding/contracts to assist with development and delivery of the campaign: 11
Number of people reporting awareness of the project (based on reach of ad-buys in legacy media and other promotional activities: 500,000
Number of legacy products that will continue to be used beyond this project: 170
Number of people reached through each of the campaign activities:
o Gift guides: 50000 impressions
o Influencer giveaways and merchant visits x 5: 150,000 impressions
o Mailbox reach (ad, Grinch, partnerships): 20,000 impressions
This project is replicable and transferable and could be adapted for use in other communities that have strong partnerships in business and economic development.
One challenge we saw was a disconnect in the training of staff by business owners on how the program worked; more scans could have taken place if employees were better trained.
We connected with merchants and requested feedback on this project. Merchants felt supported throughout this campaign and were inclined to participate again next year.
Overall satisfaction for the project came with great praise from the community.