Big things are happening at the BeadTrails Experience, and we’d like to share them with you.
BeadTrails Newest Staff Members
BeadTrails has some new faces hanging around its headquarters. We’d like to welcome you to our newest staff members, Kerri and Keaton.
Kerri and Keaton (first and second from the right respectively) have both been brought in to help with our marketing, and to tackle the new changes that are coming to the trails. Kerri was previously a freelance marketer/photographer working with small businesses, and Keaton has marketed different small to medium-sized businesses throughout the Okanagan and Lower Mainland. Welcome Kerri and Keaton!
BeadTrails is also shaking up its business model. In addition to offering self-guided tours across BC, we will soon be offering physical Okanagan tours. These ‘experiential tours’ will take customers to multiple locations, including some businesses on our current map. At each location, the customer will collect a unique bead and end the tour with a memory bracelet. Potential themes for tours include ‘Date Night,’ ‘Cultural Trip,’ and ‘Shop ‘til you Drop!’.
The goal of the event will be to provide the customer with a highly engaging, fun journey throughout the day, while also maintaining one of our current fundamental, core values of strengthening tourism and encouraging people to support our local businesses.
For more information about the tours, or if you would like your business to be a destination, please contact [email protected] or call (250)-328-9369.
BeadTrails Experience Map
7 Affirmations Logo
Be on the lookout for a new bead on the trail! We are currently designing a 7 affirmations bead for TOTA (Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association), which will be available this spring to our existing communities. We will be partnering with them for new projects and ventures. Stay tuned!
We will also be revamping our website to make minor changes and include a store. Listed on the store will be our retro beads (beads from previous business members on the trail). Beads from businesses currently on the trail will not be available online. They are only available in person and at their location.
Finally, we attended the BCRTS Tourism Summit! The BCRTS (British Columbia Regional Tourism Secretariat) is a collaboration between the Cariboo Chilcotin Coast Tourism Association, the Kootenay Rockies Tourism Association, the Northern BC Tourism Association, the Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association, and Tourism Vancouver Island.
The summit touched on many subjects, including sustainable tourism, the future of tourism, an analysis of the present condition of the industry, current challenges (such as the pandemic, labour shortages, and supply chain disruptions), visitor management, indigenous relations to tourism, truth and reconciliation, and more.
The summit held a wide range of presenters, from leaders of companies heavily affected by tourism, to CEOs of tourist associations, to professors of BC universities. We look forward to using the insights and knowledge gained from this summit to support our community and bolster our business.
Keep an eye out for all the big things to come!