Victoria Inn Invests in its Meeting and Convention Capacity

Thunder Bay has enjoyed some of Ontario's highest hotel occupancy rates over the past year due to growth across a number of segments. The convention and meeting segment, in particular, has grown significantly as the city solidifies its place as the "Unconventional Convention" destination, attracting more local, regional and provincial corporate events.

The Victoria Inn is making some changes to meet the growing demands of Thunder Bay's red hot conference market. The former Scuttlebutt's Grill and Bar space within the hotel has closed after fifteen great years and the space formerly occupied by that iconic watering hole is being transformed into new meeting and convention space. Situated adjacent to the Hotel's existing flexible space ballroom, the new renovation will connect with sliding panels to create a ball room capable of hosting up to seven hundred and fifty persons.

According to Ray Nadeau, General Manager of the Victoria Inn, the new space should be available for booking sometime in April 2012. This transformation follows a series of previous investments the hotel has made in the past several years that include renovated guest rooms and improvements to increase their environmental sustainability, making them a leader in urban sustainable tourism.

This is an encouraging sign within the community's tourism industry to see this capital reinvestment to capture growth within the meeting and convention market. The city's corporate market is a significant contributor to the city's overall tourism economy and is important to ensuring we maintain a successful four season tourism. The corporate and conference market traditionally drives late fall, winter and early spring occupancy in the city in a big way along with seasonal sport tourism events.

They way I see this is that offering more choice in meeting space will open up new opportunities that extend the benefits beyond the host hotel. Larger conferences often rely on multiple properties working together to accommodate delegates and this investment is certain to create potential new accommodation business for the five properties along the Arthur St strip. This will also have the potential to increase opportunities in the airline, rental car and culinary segments.

Congrats to Ray and the Victoria Inn for making this investment into the meeting and convention segment.

Local Tourism Partners Recognized for Going Green

Environmental responsibility is integral to maintaining the sustainability of our tourism industry and the experiences we offer visitors into the future. Its not just the resource based outfitters that need to consider the principals of sustainability but every partner, urban or rural, has a role to play. We believe that the principals of sustainable tourism are a key foundation of our municipal tourism strategy and can be implemented by all of our partners irregardless of the experiences they promote.

In 2004, the City of Thunder Bay, in partnership with the Zero Waste Action Team, implemented the Municipal Green Awards, that called for applicants to set specific goals to reduce, reuse, recycle or divert waste or improve the management of resources within the community, their business or organization. On March 1, The City of Thunder Bay recognized a number of Thunder Bay businesses and organizations for their actions during 2009 in becoming more environmentally sustainable. Two of those organizations are our tourism partners.

VICTORIA INN HOTEL AND CONVENTION CENTRE

The Victoria Inn Hotel and Convention Centre (www.vicinn.com) has implemented many energy saving initiatives to reduce their consumption of natural resources. In the kitchen area, a new hot water booster was installed, which reduces overall usage on the main boilers. A new high efficiency dishwasher was also installed and a proper servicing schedule has been developed to ensure proper efficiency of the unit is maintained. In the kitchen area, a second rational cook unit was installed replacing 4 outdated convection ovens. This area has also seen a cardboard bailer added and it has reduced cardboard pick up by 50%. In the banquet area, they have added stainless steel table tops and are no longer required to cover and skirt the buffet and display tables. This initiative has shown a reduction in the amount of laundry being processed, which has decreased water usage. In the laundry area, they have upgraded all the commercial washers and now operate 3 high efficiency units, which have reduced total wash cycle counts. There is also a program in place with their chemical supplier to ensure that exact measurements are used in their washing program. Rooms, within the hotel, have dual flush toilets which have shown a 20% reduction in water usage. Recycling containers and a towel wash program are also in place. They have also implemented a “green” team that engages both management and staff to work together to come up with ways to show ongoing environmental stewardship.

OLG CASINO THUNDER BAY

OLG Casino Thunder Bay (www.olg.ca) continues to demonstrate environmental stewardship within the community by continuing to reduce the amount of waste going to landfill. A waste audit identified that OLG Casino Thunder Bay was recycling 74% of recyclable material, including 80 pounds of shrink wrap, 80 pounds of batteries, 1500 coffee trays and 1500 pounds of organic waste was vermicomposted. Take out containers, from its restaurant, are made of sustainable bamboo material and placed in a recyclable brown paper bag. Their annual use of bottled water has been reduced by 7,000 bottles and more than 27,000 decks of cards are recycled annually. Also, reusable float bags were purchased, eliminating the use of more than 52,000 plastic bags annually. OLG Casino Thunder Bay has a “green” team information board to educate staff of their commuter challenge, garbage free lunches, and “green” Christmas initiatives.

Congratulations to the Victoria Inn and OLG Casino Thunder Bay for raising the bar in environmental sustainability.

If you want to learn more about what your business can do to become more environmentally sustainable, Earthwise Thunder Bay has created a great tool kit to help you find the way. You can download it at: http://www.thunderbay.ca/Living/Environment/EarthWise_Thunder_Bay/Net-Zero_Guide_for_Business.htm