Fireworks is key for Santa Claus Day, the biggest event the Watson and District Chamber of Commerce puts on. Now they're eyeing to expand their horizon past the yearly event (Facebook/Town of Watson).

By Aaron Schulze

Watson Chamber

Watson Chamber of Commerce aims to reshape itself

Apr 4, 2019 | 3:55 PM

The Watson and District Chamber of Commerce plans to reshape its identity.

Mostly known throughout the community for organizing the town’s Santa Claus Day, members of the Watson Chamber now looks to expand on businesses, residences, facilities, development, marketing, promotions, and communications within the area.

Kim Mitchell, president of the Watson and District Chamber of Commerce, told northeastNOW the Chamber intends to start small on expansions before tackling larger projects.

“We need to make sure our bylaws are in order before we start doing a whole lot of work,” Mitchell said. “One of the big things that our business owners want is retention of current businesses, plus expansion. Whether we do some surveys, plans, a strategic plan to find out exactly what we need, and then what kind of budget we need to make that happen.”

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The Watson Chamber currently sits at 16 members, seven of them on the board of directors.

Mitchell said the biggest growing pain with expanding the Watson Chamber has been the smaller amount of members, as all the current members are business owners and managers who have limited time to deal with the task at hand on their own.

“More hands make light work,” she said. “It’s definitely a great thing when people come on board and want to do a little bit of work. As long as your committees are running efficiently you don’t necessarily have to have a lot of board members. The committees do the work and then the board does the final decision.”

The Watson Chamber’s three committees will be for Santa Claus Day, business retention and expansion, and marketing, promotions and communications. Mitchell said the Santa Claus Day planning will run exactly as it did in the past, with none of its funds going to other Chamber projects.

With the Watson Chamber wanting to increase membership to nearly 35 by year’s end, Mitchell believes the town of under 1,000 people according the previous Census has the potential to meet their expansion goals.

“We’re on Highway 5 and 6, that is a huge thing for us,” she said. “The advantage we have over some of the other little towns around us is the fact we’re on a huge junction of five and six. I really, truly believe that’s what will help us achieve these things.”

In the meantime, Mitchell said she’s in regular talks with the Humboldt and District Chamber of Commerce on how to deal with the growing pain.

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aaron.schulze@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @SchulzePANow