Amid financial struggles during the COVID-19 pandemic, agricultural societies and exhibitions are looking for assistance from their communities and the government heading into the holidays. (Submitted Photo/Lloydminster Agricultural Exhibition Association)

By Josh Ryan

Seeking assistance

Agricultural societies, exhibitions looking for support

Dec 2, 2020 | 3:46 PM

As industries across Saskatchewan continue to struggle during the pandemic, businesses that continue to fall under the radar are those that host large public events.

Exhibition Associations are still waiting on a large response from the province and the federal government, hoping for additional funding to come, aside from some support through Tourism Saskatchewan and wage subsidies. Jocelyn Ritchie, manager at Battlefords Agricultural Society, is hoping for more information at their annual meeting on Wednesday evening, as well as a meeting with the provincial association. She said they’ve been told there are plans in place but they do not know when that will occur. That leaves limited options until that changes.

“Basically our hands are tied,” Ritchie said. “We can’t have any events, it’s not viable to have anything with 30 people. Even putting a strategic plan together is difficult, because we don’t know what going ahead is going to look like.”

Ritchie said the Society’s fixed costs with insurance, utilities, infrastructure is around $15,000 a month. There’s been thought of shifting to virtual events, but those would still not supplement their income.

“Even putting a strategic plan together is difficult, because we don’t know what going ahead is going to look like,” she said. “You can’t last forever if you don’t have any income coming in,” she said.

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One thing going for the Society is not having any loans to worry about prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ritchie said they are hoping for local donations to try and stay afloat until answers come.

“We have set up a donation page on our website as well as on our Facebook page,” she said. “Every dollar helps to keep our doors open for a month or two.”

(file photo/battlefordsNOW Staff)

That sentiment is true across the province. Jenelle Saskiw, General Manager for the Lloydminster Agricultural Exhibition Association said times have been tough for the Association in 2020, with major events like Colonial Days and the CPCA Finals being cancelled over the summer. The result is a 90 per cent decrease in revenue over the last few months.

“Not going to sugarcoat it at all, this has put a very significant financial strain on us,” Saskiw said. “So, we’re trying to find creative ways to make some money and keep our doors open as we go through this.”

Currently, the Lloyd Ex is planning on operating at their current pace for another couple months, buoyed only by their Chase the Ace contest. Saskiw said it’s frustrating, knowing what the fallout would be in communities across the prairies if they and other associations were to go under.

“If they were to close their doors, it would be near impossible to ever start up again,” she said.

To keep operations running, they’ve continued to run Chase the Ace each Wednesday, with 30 cards still remaining and a pot now sitting at more than $30,000. A new strategy is their 1,000 person campaign, a community challenge for 1,000 people to donate 100 dollars each. Looking at annual revenue, the Lloyd Ex usually sees around 250,000 people through their doors each year, which Saskiw said informed the choice on 1,000.

‘We’ve had a lot of people from a variety of ages who’ve come in and are challenging their friends and family,” she said. “Just a fun way to raise a few dollars so we can continue to operate and provide live events that our community enjoys, whenever these restrictions are lifted.”

So far, they are almost at 10 per cent of their goal, with some people donating more than 100, some matching donations.

“Being that we just launched it on Friday, it just shows what a tremendous community we have,” she said. “The public response has just been amazing.”

Before looking to public support, Saskiw said they looked at everything operationally, resulting in a number of tough decisions to reduce staff, have management take pay cuts, limit working days, and other steps to ensure they were doing everything possible trim costs without effecting overall operations.

“Honestly we wouldn’t be asking for the public’s help if we didn’t need it right now,” Saskiw said. “It would be different if we knew that we could be fully operational in four weeks. That was our mindset back in March. Here we are several months into it and we’re operating at the very base amount we can be operating at.”

(Submitted Photo/Lloydminster Agricultural Exhibition Association)

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josh.ryan@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @JoshRyanSports