2024 Year End Round Up

Brandon First was pleased to work with a significant number and variety of events this year!

Brandon was a bustling hub of events this year, drawing participants and spectators from across the country. We helped more than a dozen major and smaller events with hotel blocks, event hosting grant applications, tracking and final reports, and to connect with the vendors and venues they needed to host incredible events!

Happy volunteers at the Manitoba 55+ Games registration table

The Active Aging in Manitoba Manitoba 55+ Games (presented by Play Now) held from June 18-20, proved to be a spirited celebration of active living among seniors. Held at multiple venues across the city, the games featured nearly a dozen varied events such as pickleball, swimming, and golf as well as horseshoes, cribbage and scrabble. The three day event was a success, bringing together nearly a thousand competitors, over a hundred volunteers and highlighting the city’s dedication to supporting wellness and community engagement for older adults. As part of the 55+ Games we also held a Curling bonspiel in March, as this was a national qualifying year for the Canada 55+ Games. Approximately 100 curlers came to the Brandon Curling Club to compete in both traditional 4-person curling and 2-person team stick curling.

The 2024 Bonanza – Herefords in the Wheat City held at the Keystone Centre’s Agricultural Centre of Excellence from July 24-27 showcased our agricultural hosting capabilities by bringing livestock handlers from around the globe to Brandon to host their annual Canadian Junior show. With events like Team Grooming, Individual and Team Judging, Showmanship, Speeches, Art, Photography, Literature, and many more, Bonanza is an event of international magnitude that draws participants and visitors from all across Canada, the United States and the world.  Brandon First was pleased to provide support to this and all of the events we hosted this summer.

As August approached, Brandon hosted a series of high-profile sporting events that underscored its role as a premier destination for athletic competition. From July 31 to August 4, the city welcomed back the Canadian National High School Rodeo, featuring impressive displays of rodeo skills from top high school competitors across Canada. This was followed by the Western Canadian U13 Boys and Girls Softball Championships from August 1-4, the first Westerns of it’s kind at the Ashley Neufeld Softball Complex, securing the facility as one of the premier softball tournament locations in the nation. Additionally, the Softball Manitoba U11, U13 and U15 AA Provincials, held from July 26-28,  saw 31 teams of young athletes from across Manitoba vie for the for the provincial title in the largest tournament the ANSC has hosted to date.

In October the Manitoba Arts Network returned to Brandon to host it’s annual Showcase, an event that had previously been hosted here in 2015. #BrandonBringsYouBack Over the four days of the showcase 32 artists and nearly 150 delegates experienced the best in visual and performance arts with breakout sessions, panel discussions, visual art exhibitions, networking events and performance evenings. Our very own Executive Director, Jenn, even appeared as a panelist to discuss how arts events can generate economic impact for communities and partnerships between artists and businesses! We look forward to welcoming the Manitoba Arts Network back to Brandon for future Showcases!

The 2024 Canada Racquetball Association National Team Selection Event – “Brandon Classic” presented by the Brandon Racquetball Association at the Sportsplex

We weren’t done yet though! In November the Brandon Curling Club hosted the U21 Mixed Doubles Western Regional Qualifier, one of two Curling Canada events for youth to qualify for the Mixed Doubles Olympic Trials in Summerside, PEI in May 2025. Brandon also hosted the Canada Racquetball Association National Team Selection Event at the Sportsplex, where more than two dozen athletes competed to qualify for a spot on Team Canada. Brandon has the fastest growing, and one of the largest, youth Racquetball programs in the country, and we were happy to support it’s growth and success with this event.

We can’t wait to work with even more incredible event hosts in 2025 – stay tuned to our social media and website for some exciting announcements!

For photos of the events we worked with this year, check out our Photo Albums

Our staff was able to attend and present at some incredible industry events this year!

Sara, Eric (Keystone Centre) and Jenn at the Sport Event Congress social evening at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights

This March, the Sport Tourism Canada Sports Event Congress (SEC) was held in Winnipeg. We attend this event every year as it moves across the country; it’s our greatest opportunity to meet face to face with National Sport Organizations and events rights holders through the Sport Event Exchange, which is a little bit like speed dating – you get 7 minutes in front of each of your “dates” to make the best pitch of why they should host their event in your city. The conference also includes other incredible networking opportunities, a vendor alley, plenary sessions and presentations. Since the event was in Manitoba for the first time in recent memory, Brandon First took the opportunity to partner with Tourism Winnipeg and Travel Manitoba to co-sponsor the social evenings (a Social at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights and a merchandise and food voucher at the Jets game).

Team Manitoba Superbooth

We also partnered with our friends at the Keystone Centre to present a booth in vendor alley, located with Travel Manitoba and Tourism Winnipeg again to create a massive “Team Manitoba” booth experience. Sponsoring a plenary luncheon gave us the perfect opportunity to debut our sport hosting video, and Jenn was able to speak to nearly 300 delegates on the benefits of Brandon as a host city. Check out our video in the box below – Trident Media Group absolutely knocked it out of the park, truly capturing the best of what Brandon can do!

Jenn and Sara at the Peace Gardens to present at the Turtle Mountain Tourism Summit

In May, Jenn and Sara were asked to present a one hour facilitated workshop on business partnerships in the events and tourism industry at the 2nd Annual Turtle Mountain Tourism Summit held at the International Peace Gardens. It was an honour to be asked to present one of the breakout sessions and to provide a valuable networking and brainstorming session to the summit’s attendees. In October, Jenn traveled to Saskatoon to partake a two day intensive Festival and Events Masterclass, hosted by Paul Gudgin, who for many years ran large scale international festivals such as the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, on topics ranging from sponsorship generation, promotions and partnerships to event marketing and infrastructure.

The last major conference Brandon First was represented at was the annual national Canadian Association of Associations Executives conference, “Connection”, this year held in Ottawa. This event is a great opportunity to network with other non-profit professionals, attend learning sessions and breakouts on association management and to connect with leaders of national and regional associations to bring their AGM or other meeting to Brandon. It was an incredible year of learning and recruitment, and we’re looking forward to pursuing more of these opportunities in the upcoming year.