Museum attracting visitors
Business session to discuss keeping visitors in Glace Bay
The success of the Cape Breton Miners’ Museum will be highlighted at an upcoming gathering of the business community.
The museum attracted 16,000 visitors last year.
“We have to look at how these businesses in the Sterling, McKeen Street and the downtown core and Caledonia, how to we can work together and form a strategy to capitalize on that asset,” said Mike Kelloway, president of bayitforward. Bayitforward is hosting a free business session titled Local Wise, to be held at the Cape Breton Miners’ Museum on Feb. 13 from 11 a.m.-4 p.m.
Owners of established businesses or people considering a new business are invited to attend. Kelloway said the session will discuss how businesses can capitalize on the success of the Cape Breton Miners’ Museum.
There will also be a panel of young entrepreneurs at the event who have startups or existing businesses moderated by economist Permjot Vaila.
Vaila is the founder and CEO of Memtorcamp, co-founder of Flight and Partners Ltd., the executive director of Innovacorp’s Mentor Connect and entrepreneur-in-residence for Innovcorp’s Mementum Project.
“Permjot will be looking at how we can see people come and visit the Miners’ Museum but then not leave — stay and experience the businesses in Glace Bay.”
Mary Pat Mombourquette, executive director of the Cape Breton Miners’ Museum, will speak at the session about how the community can form partnerships.
“We want to give visitors the best experience possible so that they’ll tell people and so that they’ll come again.”
Mombourquette joined the museum in 2013 and the numbers of visitors has grown steadily over the years.
“When I started in 2013, about 13,000 visitors came in and this year we had more than 16,000. It was an exceptional year.”
As well she said 85-90 per cent of visitors were from off-island, which provides an opportunity for the business community.
“They have 16,000 visitors in Glace Bay, what can they do to make those visitors stay in Glace Bay and spend their money.”
Mombourquette said access is an issue as visitors use Commercial Street to get to the museum but they miss the business community when they leave the museum because Commercial Street is a one-way street.
“We’re even more than the downtown, we have the Sterling, we have McKeen Street, we have places there I think visitors would really enjoy to know about.”
Dave MacKeigan, vicepresident of bayitforward, hopes people will sign up and attend the session.
A recent business mixer drew 80-90 people and they want to continue to expand on that, he added.
“We want to see businesses continue to grow in Glace Bay.”
To register for the event, text 902-577-1864 or go to the bayitforward Facebook page.